Roopesh Joshi, PE, New York City Department of Environmental Protection
This presentation will discuss the Tibbetts Brook Daylighting and Greenway project. Until the late 1800s, Tibbetts Brook flowed through Westchester, into the Bronx through the Van Cortlandt plantation to Van Cortlandt Lake, and meandered its way to the Harlem River. Around 1900, Van Cortlandt Lake was connected to the newly built combined sewer system in Broadway eliminating the connection between Tibbetts Brook and the Harlem River except during combined sewer overflow (CSO) events. Under current conditions, the dry weather flow of approximately 5 million gallons a day is a constant inflow to the combined sewer system, and is treated by the Wards Island Wastewater Recovery Facility, expending energy to treat clean water. During wet weather events, peak flows from the Tibbetts Brook watershed contribute significantly to the inflows into the combined sewer system. This results in capacity limitations in the sewer system, which leads to combined sewer overflows into the Harlem River. New York City Department of Environmental Protection (DEP) worked with NYC’s Department of Parks and Recreation to develop a design that would daylight the stream and develop a parkway within the old rail corridor. The project is expected to reduce CSO discharges to the Harlem River by 215 million gallons per year, and will be the largest green infrastructure project in New York City. The project is currently in Design and is anticipated to go into construction in 2026.
The N-EWN Knowledge Series offers 1 Continuing Education Credit (CEC) per seminar. This Series is presented by N-EWN, Limnotech, the University of Georgia, and USACE ERDC.