The Morton Street Lift Station Improvements project was a mandated upgrade of an undersized and aging combined sewer lift station. As such, very specific constraints were placed on the design relating to design and construction timelines, required phasing and extremely stringent performance requirements which tested the physical limitations of the existing site. Wessler staff structured our team with a project manager who had previous contractor experience and industry leading design managers who are experts in process and electrical engineering. These professionals provided an innovative and insightful perspective on the team in carefully planning the phasing and sequencing of construction activities with the required modifications. The Morton Street Lift Station is a critical element of the City’s combined sewer conveyance network and cannot be out of service at any time. This, combined with the extremely small space inside the wet-well and electrical room for new equipment required innovative solutions that only this deliberately chosen mix of engineering and construction knowledge could provide.
At the core of this project is the replacement of four 150-horsepower vertical mixed flow (VMF) pumps with five 500-horsepower submersible pumps. The existing wet-well and electrical room were designed around the smaller VMF pumps and supporting equipment. Wessler’s design team had to think outside the box to maximize the use of the existing infrastructure for the larger equipment. With a combined output of 100,000 gallons per minute (gpm), Wessler staff brought on a team of Ph.D. holders from Clemson University to design specific appurtenances to reduce vortex flow and air-entrainment. Structural designers supported the wet-well deck to allow for larger hatch openings and supported the electrical room floor to maintain the new electrical equipment.
The Wessler team is proud to have kept all electrical portions of the work in-house. Our experienced team took advantage of its long-standing relationship with Rockwell to source five 500-horsepower VFDs and every element of the electrical system was designed to be entirely replaced while keeping the old system in service during construction.
Wessler staff combined the best elements of highly specialized experts and engineers with real-world construction experience to deliver an end-product that is in the heart of the City’s critical conveyance network. This design met the stringent requirements of the long-term control plan (LTCP) and was carefully phased to maintain the City’s normal operations and mitigate customer impact.
