MPR: North Shore Girds for Development

North Shore Girds for Development
By Stephanie Hemphill
January 31, 2001

Septic systems are an unpleasant reality of country living. Most rural homes have a tank buried in the ground to treat wastewater. For years there have been growng concerns on the North Shore of Lake Superior, that most of those tanks aren't working properly, and untreated human waste is seeping into the groundwater and the 'big lake.' A citizens group is trying to alleviate the problem by working to extend a sewer line up the shore from Duluth. Some people think the sewer might cause more problems than it would solve.

Margaret Thomas stands on the shore of Lake Superior, outside her home in Duluth. Thomas can smell some of her neighbors' failing septic systems.

MOST OF THE HOMES along the rocky north shore of Lake Superior were built 50 or more years ago; so were the septic systems. They were rather primitive even then, and today most of them - perhaps 80 percent - aren't doing the job. The discharge from holding tanks isn't being thoroughly purified because of the clay soils, high water table, and bedrock close to the surface. "You can walk down the street and smell the sewage even now. It drains under the road, and one down the street is very offensive when you walk by," says Margaret Thomas, who lives right on the shore just inside the Duluth city limits.

People here have talked about the problem for years. Now a citizens group is working towards a possible solution. It's asking the Western Lake Superior Sanitary District to extend a sewer line from its treatment plant in Duluth up the shore about eight miles, to the town of Knife River. The state has promised $7 million - about half the cost of building the line.

Residents will have to pay as much as $1,000 up front to hook up to the sewer, and then a monthly fee, perhaps $100. That amount will drop after the bonds are paid off in 20 years.

Some people worry that retired people on fixed incomes might have a tough time paying that much, but at least they won't have to spend a lot of money all at once on a new septic system.

"Engineers have worked in the past to try and figure ways to cluster septic tanks and that hasn't worked," Thomas says. "The soil here is not good for drainage. So the more growth there is in terms of residential or commercial growth - and it has been happening - the more pressure on the water."

But Thomas is concerned about how the sewer line could change the North Shore forever.

Individual septic systems require lots of space, so houses have to be built on large lots. A sewer will allow intensive development in a very popular part of the state.

Phil Meany likes to show off his Japanese ultra-low-flow toilet. He says it could be an alternative to the sewer line.

"It has a computer chip, you set it for intervals of foaming and flushing. I've got another one on the lower level, and it feeds down into a composting tank," he says.

In the basement are two tanks - one for waste from the toilet, the other for graywater from showers, sinks, and the washing machine. The graywater is treated in the tank to remove environmentally unfriendly elements so it can be spread in a drain field near the house. The toilet-waste tank in the basement is a self-contained compost pile, and twice a year Meany gets a few buckets of soil to put around his rose bushes.

"We represent a model that at least opens the door to what might be possible in the future," he says. "You have to decide whether you're going to go with some large centrally-located system, which might be more appropriate in higher density cases, or try some modifications of that."

Meany admits this kind of system isn't for everyone. Most people don't want to fuss much with their waste, or to have a compost tank in their basement. And although it's cheaper than the standard septic systems currently approved for the North Shore, it is a hefty $10,000 investment.

But Meany says if there were more demand, the price would go down. And a system like his could serve several houses at once, with the tanks in a separate building. That way they could be tended by a contractor or public authority like a sewer board. Such cluster systems are the way of the future for rural areas, according to the engineering consultant working with North Shore residents, Pete Weidman.

"We still firmly believe that's the direction we need to go. It is successful in other parts of the state, Rochester is using a little bit of that right now, and it will come about in its own time. And that's the future for areas that will not have a pipeline," Weidman says.

Weidman says people on the North Shore are tired of waiting and ready to go with a sewer line. Shore resident Toni Fladmark agrees people are impatient for an answer, but she's not convinced the sewer line is the right one.

"Most of the citizens in this area kind of feel like 'I thought we were looking into it but instead it appears to be a done deal.' We needed to look at it, we wanted to decide if that's what we really want and now it's almost like we don't have the choice. It took on a life of its own and now here it is," says Fladmark.

Fladmark volunteered to serve on the township planning board, to try to control the explosion of growth she thinks is inevitable with the sewer line extension. The citizens group is working hard to get ready to build the sewer line, scheduled to start a year from now, if all the needed permits are approved. And then Fladmark and her neighbors - having solved their toilet problems - can begin to confront issues brought on by growth.

Part Two: Following the Sewer Line

Stephanie Hemphill covers northeast Minnesota for Minnesota Public Radio. Reach her via e-mail at shemphill@mpr.org.

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