The Town of Surfside is a beautiful oceanfront community located in the tropical paradise of South Florida. The Town, with a population of approximately 5,838 inhabitants, combines a tranquil, attractive, residential neighborhood with a traditional “home town” shopping district and a number of resorts and hotels which host tourists and other visitors all year around.
The Town currently purchases its water from Miami-Dade County. The Town’s sewage flows through Miami Beach and ultimately to Miami-Dade County. The Town is charged for every gallon of water used and pays the County for treatment and disposal of every gallon of material which flows through our sewer lines.
Although the Town has been maintained as the beautiful beach town that we all know and love, the Town’s underground infrastructure has endured many years of deferred maintenance. These underground utilities were installed in the 1930s-1940s and no major rehabilitation has been performed since its original installation date. The three major utilities that will be rehabilitated through this project are the sewer, water and drainage systems.
Gravity and Force Main Sanitary Sewer System
The Town received a consent decree from the US Environmental Protection Agency stating that repairs must be made to the sanitary sewer system or the Town could be punished via fines and other penalties. The repairs required must reduce the inflow of ground water into the sanitary sewer system and reduce the amount of exfiltration of sewage into the surrounding ground and ground water. The system improvements included in the design will address both inflow and exfiltration.
The Town’s engineers currently estimate that of the total sewage being processed by Miami Dade County for treatment, approximately 35% is ground water introduced to the system via inflow/infiltration. This is important to note due to the fact that the County charges the Town for every gallon of material they process. Once the groundwater inflows into the sanitary sewer system, it must be treated as sewage and is billed to the Town at the established unit rates.
The repairs to the system to address the inflow of ground and rain water into the sanitary sewer system are point repairs, lining and man hole rehabilitation. Point repairs are the digging up and complete replacement of the sewer line. Lining consists of installing a slip liner inside of the existing sewer line and man hole rehabilitation consists of lining the man holes and repairing the seal on the man hole lids.
Potable Water Distribution System
The current distribution lines are small in diameter, aging and are located in the back of the houses which they serve. The rehabilitation for this utility addresses all three of these issues by complete replacement with larger diameter pipes located in the front of the houses which they serve.
Currently the County code requires that all water main services and meters be located in the front of the buildings which they serve. Also, the current system does not meet fire flow requirements or fire hydrant coverage requirements.
Storm Drainage Improvements
The current system is not designed to convey enough water to handle larger storms. Also, the current system conveys 100% of the storm water collected into the Bay. The design proposed for this utility does not replace existing lines, but adds additional structures, lines and wells to convey additional storm water during heavy storm events. The proposed wells will also take some of the burden off of the Bay by conveying a portion of the storm water into the wells.