By Tony Langfellow
A construction project to replace nearly 100-year-old sewer lines in downtown Green Bay and a small portion of Allouez gets underway Thursday.
The project will cause some temporary road closures as crews improve the aging infrastructure.
This is a critical project. Super important for our community. They're the largest, some of the deepest and oldest sewers in our community," NEW Water Executive Director Nathan Qualls said.
Qualls said there actually isn't anything seriously wrong with the current sewers. However, given their age, the replacement project is key to ensuring nothing devastating does happen.
"We're trying to be proactive. We don't want to wait until we have a failure. We need to be proactive to maintain our services for our community," Qualls said.
he cost of the project is $29 million and will be helped paid for by area municipalities, along with financing from the Clean Water State Revolving Fund program. In total, 13,000 feet of sanitary sewer will be rehabilitated.
The new pipes crews are installing will be dropped down a manhole and simply line the inside of the old concrete sewers. Qualls said it’s more efficient than entirely digging up the roads.
"The technology in this part of the project is called 'cured in place pipe.' It's common technology. It basically puts like a new tube inside that existing pipe," Qualls said.
The new lining will provide extra structural support to help prevent collapsing and reduce water leakage.
Sewer replacement will be happening in downtown Green Bay on the east side of the Fox River on North Adams Street, up to Main Street and along the East River.
he project won't come without its disruptions to people and businesses.
The Automobile Gallery in Green Bay has several events throughout the year, including this weekend, and draws in people from all over.
"Hopefully, we can work with local officials and make sure that we have traffic flow through, especially here at the gallery, because we're a downtown destination," Director of Curation & Preservation at The Automobile Gallery Darrel Burnett said.
Burnett worries, depending on the magnitude of construction, it could impact people's commute and parking for those events.
"We will look at opening up our other entrances and allowing people to get in, because the one thing we don't want to have happen is people have to struggle to get into our business," Burnett said.
On Thursday, Main Street from Monroe Avenue to Jackson Street will be closed until noon Friday. The entire sewer project is expected to be complete by late 2026.
To learn more about this project, and/or to sign up for project updates, please visit www.newwater.us/downtown