2) Sanitary Sewers are designed to convey residential, commercial and industrial waste to the City's wastewater treatment facilities. The City of Windsor maintains approximately 744 kilometres of sanitary sewers (including force mains).
3) Combined Sewers were constructed throughout the City until the 1950s. Combined sewers carry both storm water and sanitary waste in a single pipe. Storm water and sanitary water flow together to the City's wastewater treatment plants through 207 kilometres of combined sewers.
4) Over-and-Under Sewers consist of a dedicated sanitary sewer pipe with a larger, separate storm pipe installed directly over it. There are 33 kilometres (included in storm and sanitary totals) of over-and-under sewers in Windsor which flow to the City's wastewater treatment plants.
Together, combined and over-and-under sewers represent approximately 14% of the entire sewer system.
The City of Windsor has two wastewater treatment plants, the Lou Romano Water Reclamation Plant (LRWRP) and the Little River Pollution Control Plant (LRPCP). The Lou Romano Water Reclamation Plant serves approximately two-thirds of Windsor and accepts sanitary flow from the Town of LaSalle. The Little River Pollution Control Plant serves east Windsor and accepts sanitary flows from the Town of Tecumseh.
In addition to the two pollution control plants, the City has forty-four pumping stations (6 sanitary, 5 combined and 33 storm), 8 combined sewer overflows (CSO) interceptors and numerous storm water retention ponds. Pumping stations are a major component of the sewer network as they pump sanitary and storm water to the appropriate locations for either treatment or discharge. All sanitary pump stations have back-up power. All storm water pump stations, with few exceptions, have either back-up power, overflows or excess storage capacity i.e. storm water retention ponds.
In 2011, the City constructed the Mario Sonego Retention Treatment Basin (RTB) on the riverfront. The RTB was a major capital investment with a cost of approximately $67M. The RTB captures, stores and treats combined sewer overflows that, prior to its construction, would otherwise have discharged directly to the Detroit River. Following a wet weather event, the solids retained by the RTB are conveyed by the river front sewer network to the LRWRP for further treatment.
All pump stations are monitored remotely from the LRWRP. Pollution Control Wastewater Treatment and Collection Operators are licensed by the Ministry of Environment, Conservation and Parks, to operate the various facilities and perform regular preventative maintenance to ensure that the pumping stations and plants operate efficiently and without catastrophic failure.
The Sewer Master Plan and the Storm Water Financing Study are both currently under way and are expected to be completed in 2020. These plans will identify the needs of our sewer and storm water systems and outline corrective actions that will be required over the short and long-term time horizons to address these items. These plans will also estimate the additional funding that will be required to undertake that work as well as