The Shawnee Park Combined Sewer Overflow (CSO) Basin project, also known as the Southwestern Parkway CSO Basin, was nationally recognized and honored with three awards at the Design-Build Institute of America’s (DBIA) 2019 Design-Build Conference & Expo  The awards received are as follows:

• National Award of Excellence in the Water/Wastewater category (Top honor – one awarded per year in the United States)

• Best in Design for Engineering in all categories (Top honor – one awarded per year in the United States)

Underground storage is part of MSD’s endeavor to prevent wastewater from overflowing into Louisville’s waterways. The Portland Combined Sewer Overflow (CSO) Basin is the last of 10 basins contained in MSD’s Consent Decree. The 10 basins provide a total storage capacity of nearly 195 million gallons, protecting our local waterways and public health and safety. MSD’s Waterway Protection Tunnel, which is under construction, will add another 55 million gallons of storage capacity.

There are plenty of legal ways to dispose of furniture. Dumping it into a stream isn’t really one of them.

But that was what Louisville MSD faced on Tuesday, August 20, after a report from Louisville Public Works of furniture found in Goose Creek at Westport Road. MSD crews used a “clamshell” truck—commonly utilized in cleaning stormwater basins on the side of roadways—to remove a three-piece sectional, along with a mattress and box spring, 

Louisville MSD and the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers are taking a big step in improving the Beargrass Creek watershed. Today, the two entities announced they are working together on the Three Forks Beargrass Creek Ecosystem Restoration Feasibility Study, which is one of only six new General Investigation Feasibility Study projects to be selected by the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers nationwide in a competitive pool of applicants for funding. The local project is the only ecosystem restoration and the sole inland project chosen nationwide.

Important safety upgrades to two vital water quality treatment centers and continuing our progress in reducing pollution from sewer overflows with proceeds from a rate increase taking effect next month.

MSD’s board outlined a preliminary rate proposal in May and voted Monday, July 29, to approve the increase. It will take effect Thursday, August 1, and will increase the average wastewater bill by $3.47 per month and the average stormwater bill by $0.68 per month.

Teachers at Fairdale High School are getting a head start on the upcoming school year with a teacher’s conference at Louisville MSD’s Central Maintenance Facility. The event for approximately 50 teachers uses meeting space at the facility.

By Sharise Horne

Under the Great Lawn in Shawnee Park, sits the MSD Shawnee Park Combined Sewer Overflow (CSO) Basin. The top of the basin is approximately 12 feet below grade, with three-foot-thick reinforced concrete walls. When it rains, the basin is hard at work protecting the Ohio River, the Park and the neighborhood from combined sewer overflows. 

On Friday, June 21, MSD joined Mayor Greg Fischer and Shawnee Park neighbors to celebrate the end of more than two years of construction work on the basin.

How it works

Louisville MSD’s embracing of technology in helping maintain safe, clean waterways was acknowledged April 15 in winning the 2019 INFORMS Franz Edelman Award. MSD received the award in partnership with Canadian engineering services firm Tetra Tech.

The award acknowledges MSD and Tetra Tech in pioneering the first major application of Csoft Real-Time Control (RTC) for system-wide sewer optimization.