Photo by heather.dyan

Photo by heather.dyan

Though we’re barely a week into summer, the D.C. area has already seen its fair share of intense thunderstorms. For Bloomingdale and LeDroit Park residents, “summer” and “thunderstorms” are usually synonymous with flooding and lots of wet carpet. (Never forget: summer of Derecho).

This morning, the city broke ground on the First Street Tunnel, which will help prevent bad flooding during intense rainstorms in the two neighborhoods. The 20-and-a-half foot tunnel, which will run under First Street NW from Channing Street to Rhode Island Avenue NW, will “hold eight million gallons of wastewater and stormwater during heavy rain events, using temporary pumping station to carry flow into the Northeast Boundary sewer after the storm passes,” a release states. Construction of the tunnel, which is being overseen by DC Water, is projected to be complete in spring of 2016.

At today’s groundbreaking ceremony, Mayor Vince Gray, who created a task force to come up with solutions to flooding in that area, said that “residents in these neighborhoods have seen improvement already, and long-term relief is on the way at a faster pace.”

The First Street Tunnel is part of a larger project by DC Water, the Clean Rivers Project, which aims to “resolve the flooding issues in [different] neighborhoods,” through a series of underground tunnels. That’s scheduled to be complete by 2025.

DC Water General Manager Hawkins said in a release that his “team investigated more than 40 different engineering solutions and crafted a creative plan to address the flooding with incredible speed. The two measures in place have proven successful through the tests of this springs rains. These solutions by themselves do not solve the problem—we most likely will still have flooding in a severe storm—but the progress is apparent and we are well on our way to offering lasting relief.”

Filed Under: bloomingdale, dc water, first street tunnel, flooding, ledroit park,