Overlapping Programming | Wastewater Facilities | Drinking Water Supply |
Solid and Hazardous Waste | Electric, Power & Pipelines | Communications | Stormwater Facilities
Wastewater Facilities
Coordination and cooperative planning between municipalities, utility providers, and other involved agencies is fragmented, yet vital to the success of land development and land preservation across municipal boundary lines and the region.
Throughout the county, municipalities have enacted their own ordinances and Act 537 Plans for sewage disposal; however these do not always coincide with neighboring communities or adjacent regional planning efforts. There is a need to educate and encourage coordination between municipalities to ensure that all effected plans and ordinances are being complied with. As the results of the Landscapes2 survey show, many of the issues facing municipalities today go beyond their borders. Those who responded to the survey identified cooperative planning between municipalities as the third most important topic residents would like to see addressed in the county.
Ensuring the proper operation and maintenance of on-lot sewage disposal systems is becoming more complicated due in part to lot clustering in areas not served by public sewer services, and the location of replacement beds into community and homeowner association open space.
Since the adoption of Landscapes in 1996, many developers are minimizing lot size to retain open space and protect fragile resources. While a noble goal, many of these lots can accommodate only the primary disposal system while secondary systems are being located within the community or homeowners association (HOA) open space where they go unmonitored and are often improperly maintained. Homeowners may not know the location of their replacement systems, and as a result, are not aware if their system is failing.
There is a need for a closer examination of development design in terms of providing the most appropriate means of sewage disposal.
Municipal Act 537 Plans identify areas of a municipality that are to receive public sewage disposal and which areas are to utilize subsurface sewage disposal. Once these Plans are in place, and approved by the Pennsylvania Department of Environmental Protection (PADEP), it is imperative that municipalities enforce their plans and require developments to select the most appropriate disposal option, as outlined in the Act 537 Plan.
Local land use decisions have regional impacts as infrastructure has struggled to keep pace with development.
As the population of Chester County has increased, so has the need for upgraded infrastructure. There is a need for additional sewer and water capacity, extension of electric, gas and communication systems, and a need for managing storm water runoff. As a result of these additional stresses on public infrastructure, there is often a need to expand service areas or rebuild facilities to accommodate new users. In addition to the effect development has on historic, natural and scenic resources, it also has a profound effect on the infrastructure that is in place. Local decisions have a regional impact. While often providing a positive contribution to the local tax base, decisions can place excessive demands on the existing infrastructure.
There is a growing need to upgrade aging infrastructure and obtain the necessary funding to perform those upgrades.
The need to upgrade aging infrastructure in our City and Boroughs is moving to the fore front as redevelopment gains popularity. How to fund these systems has become an important issue facing the County. Larger regional systems have more resources at their disposal, and have the potential for new user fees and tap-in fees to help fund system upgrades, whereas many older urban systems have few new users or service area extensions to perform similar upgrades. As a result, there are many entities competing for the same funding opportunities, such as Penn Vest and Community Development grants.
Emerging contaminants are being found in increasing concentrations in wastewater.
Senior living developments and assisted living facilities are starting to experience increased pharmaceutical pollution in wastewater due to the medications that residents are taking. As a result, measures are needed to address the negative effect on land disposal, surface and groundwater contamination, and wastewater treatment.
The requirements of the Chesapeake Bay Tributaries Initiative are having a direct effect on the permitting and function of wastewater treatment plants throughout western Chester County.
Municipalities in western Chester County are facing the unique challenge of accommodating the wastewater needs of a growing population, while at the same time addressing the obligation to limit nutrient discharges into the tributaries of the Chesapeake Bay. According to the Chesapeake Bay Tributary Strategies, the cause of increased nutrient discharges into the Bay is primarily due to population growth. Increased population leads to increased discharge rates from sewage treatment plants. This increased discharge, when combined with the discharges of on-lot sewage disposal systems, complicates the expansion of and upgrades to existing infrastructure. Some regional sewer authorities are finding it difficult to comply with requirements that call for a no-net-increase of nutrients entering the watershed. The rising cost of real estate for land application of treated effluent further complicates this issue.
Moratoriums on older municipally-owned systems can discourage development and redevelopment opportunities in urbanized areas and potentially encourage growth and sprawl in non-developed areas of the county.
Municipal governments and wastewater authorities are facing greater complications when attempting to expand or upgrade sewage treatment infrastructure. Due to increasingly stringent regulations on water quality, such as the TMDL Program and NPDES Program, more moratoriums are being issued by the Department of Environmental Protection to halt new connections to treatment plants. These moratoriums commonly call for a ceasing of new discharges into the surface waters of the County. In many cases, the treatment plants that are in need of upgrading are small, municipally-owned systems in urbanized areas. In some cases these moratoriums can discourage redevelopment and new development in areas that Landscapes encourages it, such as areas where wastewater treatment plants and systems already exists.
There is a concern among environmental agencies that streams are approaching their carrying capacity to process and dilute pollutants. At that time, treated wastewater effluent will have to be disposed of in another manner.
This issue poses many questions that involve regulatory and enforcement frameworks. The TMDLs and other programs under development will regulate the amount of pollutants and nutrients allowed into water bodies. At issue is how to proceed if these regulations determine that the streams of Chester County are at their carrying capacity for nutrients and pollutants.
The need to extend public sewer services to rural areas with failing septic systems is in direct conflict with the Landscapes policy to restrict such extension into Rural Landscapes.
While extending public sewer services into the Rural Landscape is in direct conflict with Landscapes, sometimes it is necessary for the public health and safety of the residents. There is a need to explore the possibility of establishing a monitoring process that would offer water testing to ensure a safe supply to well users.
Overlapping Programming | Wastewater Facilities | Drinking Water Supply |
Solid and Hazardous Waste | Electric, Power & Pipelines | Communications | Stormwater Facilities
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