Almost four years after the city admitted 24 billion litres of combined sewage and wastewater had spilled into Chedoke Creek, public works confirmed Tuesday that on-site activities in its remediation plan finished as of Saturday.
In an update sent to city council on the weekend, staff wrote that some 16,000 tonnes of sediment were removed over six months and transported off-site via 300 truckloads to meet a Dec. 31, 2023 deadline set by the province.
“So really it’s been a lot of earth movement on site and making sure that all of the dried sediment is moved to an appropriate and certified landfill,” the city’s director of watershed management Cari Vanderperk explained.
Over the past month, contaminated waste has been trucked to Twin Creeks Landfill in Watford, Ont., just an hour west of London.
Public works staff says next steps involve notifying the Ministry of the Environment, Conservation and Parks (MECP) and undertaking a site cleanup – including the dismantling of a pond and disposal of materials within some barriers.
It’s expected both will be completed sometime in January with final touches, including restoration of Kay Drage Park, beginning in the spring as weather permits.
Vanderperk says all work tied to the provincial order is done but improving water quality via three municipal class environmental assessments is still to come.
“We’re looking at probably mid-to-late next year before those are complete,” she revealed.
“That’s really looking at various environmental works that can be done within the watershed to improve the water quality inputs to Chedoke Creek and then to Cootes Paradise.”
The Kay Drage fix-up will likely mean laying down new sod and putting the space “back to what it was” before heavy machinery arrived for the remediation.
“There’s also some restoration work that’ll be done along the banks of the creek just to ensure that … if there is any plants or vegetation that was flattened by the machinery that we’re replanting … that back to the way that it was,” according to Vanderperk.
The dredging work was part of an MECP order to clean the waterway, which flows into Cootes Paradise and Hamilton Harbour, following the release of untreated wastewater between 2014 and 2018.
After finishing in mid-November 2023, Vanderperk said the city was dealing with a hiccup tied to hauling away contaminated sentiment after a truck was turned away by GFL’s outlet in Upper Stoney Creek.
The issue stemmed from MECP concerns that environmental compliance approval provisions were unmet.
Vanderperk said the city was seeking another dump where the material could be disposed of that was still near the city.
“We’re trying to weigh the issue of logistics, and we want to make sure that we’re finding a landfill that’s in close proximity that can accept waste from a municipally owned sewage works,” she said Nov. 30.
At the time, only eight of the estimated 400 truckloads they hoped to haul away from Kay Drage had made it to a landfill.
Ministry spokesperson Gary Wheeler explained to Global News that GFL’s operating approval prohibits sewage waste disposal and only permits the disposal of contaminated soils.
“The ministry informed GFL and the city that material from the Chedoke Creek Remediation project may contain sewage material,” Wheeler said.
“When GFL was informed of the potential presence of sewage in the dewatered sediments, GFL independently decided to refrain from accepting these materials.”