Outgoing Mayor Brenda Gunter welcomed a group of attendees to a ribbon-cutting ceremony marking the virtual completion of the new lifting station and pipeline that will eliminate the serious sewer bottleneck situation plaguing the area for years.
Members of the San Angelo City Council joined administrators, contractors and the Chamber of Commerce’s Concho Cadre, for the event held near Lake Park on South Concho Drive Thursday morning.
“A Big Day For San Angelo”
“Today is a big day for San Angelo,” Gunter told the crowd. “We’ve been talking about Lake Nasworthy’s lack of sewer capacity for many years, and finally, this Council made a decision to get this project done.”
Gunter outlined how the improvements will aid in economic development near the airport, and explained that the projecct took some time complete because of the difficulty in acquiring all of the necessary permits.
“I know sewage isn’t something people like to talk about, but you’ve got to have the ability and capacity to expand into the future.
“What we’ve built allows us to take care of the issue today, and will also take care of the future growth that we expect.”
Solving A Long Standing Problem
SMD 1 Rep. Tommy Hiebert said when he was elected to city council in 2017, some of the first telephone calls he received were from business owners near Loop 306 concerned about “noxious odors” created by sewer problems in the area.
“Believe it or not, the lack of capacity (of this system) created noxious odors that far away,” Hiebert said, “and some businesses had to close because of the odors.
“So as the mayor said, it’s odd to be celebrating what we’re celebrating, but it’s definitely a good thing.”
Economic Development Implications
SMD 2 Rep. and mayoral candidate Tom Thompson focused on the economic -development aspect of the improvements.
“When this lift station goes online here in about a month, what happens is we have a long-term gain and success, with millions of dollars of commercial development that will be available on this side of the bridge.
“There are so many people who’ve talked about this…in 20 years, you will look back and say that it’s one of the key things that developed this side of the lake.”
City Manager Daniel Valenzuela spoke about the enhanced safety of the new configuration.
“Having a uncased (sewer) main going through the lake at this point just wasn’t safe for us,” he said. “We wanted to make sure we only had cased mains running through there, so the safety factor, as far as any type of spillage, is greatly reduced.”
Kelton Adds Details
In a post-ceremony interview San Angelo Public Works Director Shane Kelton spoke about the project at greater length, and said the project has been underway for about 24 months.
“The pipeline started first,” he explained. “We had about 10.4 miles of pipeline to construct, so that was Phase A, and this lift station is Phase B, which we’ve been doing for 6 or 7 months.”
Kelton said the city will save plenty in the long run, as they expect to eliminate five existing lift stations with the addition of this one, and since they already had the extra capacity built-in at the treatment plant, no improvements were needed there.
He added that the configuration changes will “help immensely” by reducing service calls related to the old lift stations.
According to information from the city, the old system had been installed piecemeal over several decades, using 26 separate lift stations and 106 grinders to move waste to the treatment plant.
The Lake Nasworthy wastewater system, with an average volume of 500,000 gallons per day accounts for about one-sixteenth of the 8 million gallons treated by the plant daily.
The new infrastructure will increase the overall capacity of the Nasworthy system to 2.5 million gallons, creating opportunities for development in that area.
Total construction costs for the Lake Nasworthy Wastewater System Improvements project was $31.6 million. The funds came from the Lake Nasworthy Fund, approved by voters in 2019, and by bond funds secured by the City Council.
Officials say the pipeline is about 95-percent complete and scheduled to be online within 60 days.
Early Water and Sewer History
In the beginning, the water system around town was simple — you took buckets to the river.
But as the town began to grow, fresh water quickly became civic leaders’ first, second and third concerns; with the accompanying sewage situation handled mostly by latrines and septic cisterns.
While they don’t receive a great deal of attention outside of things going wrong, the water and sewer systems of a city do more to make life livable than any other single factor.
According to information from the Tom Green Co. Historical Society, the first improvement to water delivery around town was a wagon with a barrel full of water that saved people those pesky trips to the river. According to historical reports, Mexican families specialized in the trade, which was fairly profitable.
The next big step came in 1884, when almost 2,000 people were living here, and town leaders knew they needed something better.
As was often the case in those days, a private interest arose to solve the problem for a profit.
The Water Works
The San Angelo Water Works Co. was incorporated on April 28 of that year by James L. Millspaugh, with operations set up on the south side of West Concho Avenue between Irving and Randolph streets.
Pipes for the project came from Pittsburg by rail to Abilene, and were then freighted overland by wagon to San Angelo.
Millspaugh’s plan was to pump water from North Concho River directly into his system, since the water quality was pure enough at that time that contamination was not a concern.
According to the March 1885 Sanborn Map Co. survey of “San Angela” looking at the fire risks of town, the community was severely lacking in firefighting capacity with no hand-pumps or hose carts, and an incomplete water system.
The map notes that “Water Works being built, to be completed by Sept. 1885 Water to be pumped from Concho River into tank of 60,000 gallons capacity, elevated 60 feet above level of streets. To have cart and hose when works are completed.
This system continued to expand gradually until around 1890 when concerns about contamination caused the intake to be moved to the South Concho.
The town’s population was nearing 3,000 at that time, and crowding suddenly became a problem.
Big Strides for San Angelo
By the time the Sanborn surveyors returned in 1894, the water system and the town had come a long way.
The Water Works are noted to be gravity flow and direct pressure from a 130-foot tall standpipe with 61,000 gallons, supplied from the Concho River 1-mile south of the courthouse by a pair of Deane steam compound duplex pumps with a capacity of 1.75 million gallons every 24 hours.
The survey also shows 7 1/2 miles of water mains with 59 double Beaumont hydrants.
It’s also noted the town’s volunteer fire department has four stations and 36 men, two hose carts, 1,200-feet of first-class firehose, one hook-and-ladder truck and an electric fire alarm system.
Over the next few decades, the water monopoly was reorganized, improved and sold, being a holding of San Angelo Water, Light and Power; the Interstate Electric Corporation of New York and finally West Texas Utilities Co. of Abilene, the company that built Lake Nasworthy in 1929. The City of San Angelo officially acquired the water system in 1951.
What About the Sewer System?
According to the Historical Society, the first sewer system dates back to 1895. It was very limited and served fewer than a dozen connections on an 800-foot stretch from Chadbourne Street at Beauregard Avenue down to the Concho River.
Known as the Lasker Line, it’s thought to have been named for a millionaire investor from Galveston who was active in town at the time.
The San Angelo Sewer Company, owned by D.T. Jones, C.C. Kirkpatrick, a Dr. Jones and Pat Dooley, purchased this line in 1900, operating and expanding the system until the city took it over in 1925.
