City Council Member Lincoln Restler praised state regulators for proposing a more ambitious solution to the periodic “poo-namis” that plague Newtown Creek. (Photo via Legistar)
By Jack Delaney | jdelaney@queensledger.com
“No poop in Bushwick Inlet Park! That’s the message that I very plainly want to testify to today.”
City Council Member Lincoln Restler said it with a grin, inviting chuckles from his fellow committee members. But the context is impressive: If a $3 billion proposal to build a sewage tunnel under Brooklyn’s northern tip is realized, it could mean 74% less fecal matter flowing into Newtown Creek and the East River, and none into waterways around Williamsburg’s unfinished Bushwick Inlet Park.
On Friday, March 26, the planned Newtown Creek CSO Tunnel cleared a major hurdle when the City Council authorized a list of sites that will need to be acquired before construction can begin, keeping the project on track to complete its land use review by the end of April.
Nearly 60% of New York City’s sewage system involves combined sewer overflow, or CSO, meaning that the underground pipes collect both bathroom waste and rainwater. In dry weather, that’s not an issue — rainwater rushes out of vents, while the more viscous materials are routed to a treatment facility.
During storms, however, the pipes can be overwhelmed, causing the rainwater to carry feces out of vents that release into waterways like Newtown Creek and the Gowanus Canal, where long-suffering residents have coined a term for the event: a “poo-nami.”
Plans to create a storage tunnel under the creek that can divert the heavier waste have been discussed since at least the 1990s, when the state ruled that the toxic artery’s condition violated the Clean Water Act. Newtown Creek was designated a Superfund site in 2010, and a wastewater treatment plant was completed in 2012, but it would take until 2017 for the CSO tunnel — as part of the state-run “Long Term Control Plan” — to be formally suggested.
“I firstly want to commend the Department of Environmental Protection (DEP)… for proposing this update to the Long Term Control Plan,” said Restler at an earlier hearing. “This was not mandated, they were not directed to do this. They did it because it was the right thing to do.”
The DEP estimates that the project, most of which is underground, will displace eight businesses and 85 employees currently working on the properties it will be purchasing. As part of an environmental review, the department found that noise pollution from construction would mainly affect the green spaces along the Newtown Creek Nature Walk and the in-progress North Henry Street Restoration. The work will also impact two intersections, Greenpoint Ave and Kingsland Ave/Van Dam St respectively, where DEP will be deploying traffic cops.
Though the City Council’s approval is good news for Greenpointers and their across-the-creek neighbors in Queens, it’s still early days for the project. The DEP estimates that land acquisition will span from mid-2026 to 2028, when the Department of Sanitation will start prepping sites for construction. If the proposed timeline holds, work on the tunnel itself won’t break ground until the end of 2029 — and the tentative completion date is December 2040.
