Water department proposes $3.4M initiative to reduce Detroit street flooding

The Detroit Water and Sewage Department said Tuesday it is seeking approval of a $3.4 million initiative to create bioretention areas in the city to reduce basement backups and street flooding that it hopes to complete by the end of 2024.

The Fenkell Stormwater Projects would install green infrastructure projects in the areas surrounding Fenkell Avenue and are being financed with $1.6 million in four federal and state grants.

Another $1.8 million allocated from DWSD capital improvement funds, the agency said, will benefit nearly 100 occupied homes with the installation of 24 bioretention gardens on Detroit Land Bank Authority parcels in Brightmoor. The areas will be designed to reduce and treat rainfall and stormwater near adjacent streets on Detroit's west side.

The project proposes to vacate about 460 feet of Blackstone Street between Midland and Keeler Streets, and will manage more than 2 million gallons of stormwater annually, officials said.

"The installation of these 24 bioretention practices will help create capacity in our combined sewer system, freeing up capacity, which will reduce streetflooding and basement backups," said Lisa Wallick, field services director for permitting and stormwater at the Detroit Water & Sewerage Department.

"The project in total will manage stormwater from appoxiamately 50 acres and treat about 9 million gallons of stormwater annually. This will help to reduce the amount of untreated combined sewage from being discharged to Rouge River."

The announcement came nearly two years following historic rainfall that caused two rounds of widespread flooding across Metro Detroit in June 2021. The first severe summer storm dumped more than 6 inches of rain on parts of Metro Detroit on June 25-26. Three weeks later, another 3.4 inches fell shortly after President Joe Biden approved a disaster declaration request on the earlier storm from Michigan Gov. Gretchen Whitmer.

Wallick said hundreds of trees and shrubs will also be installed along the grassy fields to help take on the stormwater.

The project is awaiting City Council approval before construction can begin, Wallick said.

The June 2021 rainfall produced complaints in Detroit that were concentrated in the east and south, including the neighborhoods of Jefferson Chalmers and Cornerstone Village, according to a Great Lakes Water Authority report.

The Detroit department has installed 19 green strormwater infrastructure projects in the last seven years, according to its website, which Wallick said manages and moves nearly 53 million gallons of stormwater from the city annually.

A map of project locations can be found here.

jaimery@detroitnews.com

Twitter: @wordsbyjakkar