Major Sewer Project Planned In Old Lyme

OLD LYME The town and its beach communities are close to an agreement on a major project that would install sewers for the town's thousands of summer homes.

Small lots in each beach community are packed densely along the Long Island Sound shoreline, and most have inadequate septic systems.

Plans call for each of the town's beach communities to build its own sewer network, and the town would provide the main sewer line that would travel generally along Route 156 to East Lyme, said First Selectwoman Bonnie Reemsnyder.

From there, the line would link to existing lines in East Lyme and Waterford, and then to the regional sewage treatment plant in New London. Town officials have been told by the state Department of Energy and Environmental Protection that the New London facility can likely handle the additional sewage from Old Lyme.

"Each beach community would have their own project going within their association, and they would tie in to that main trunk line," Reemsnyder said. "This is a real collaboration between a lot of entities to accomplish resolving a lot of issues."

Old Lyme has five chartered beach communities that operate as independent taxing districts within the town. A few more beach communities, in addition to the five chartered associations, operate more like homeowners' associations and fall under the jurisdiction of the town's water pollution control authority.

Engineers are still working on cost estimates, but the project is expected to cost "tens of millions" to accomplish, Reemsnyder said. Engineers for the town and the beach communities are also working on construction timetable estimates that would lay out how to approach the project.

"It's a major undertaking," she said. "We're going to make this as painless as possible but with a project like this there will be some pain involved. Hopefully working together we can make it more cost efficient."

Old Lyme like many shoreline towns has a "sewer avoidance" ordinance that requires homeowners to have their septic systems maintained frequently. The sewer avoidance practice is common on the shoreline as small seasonal homes are only used sparingly throughout the year.

But Reemsnyder said since that ordinance was passed in the 1990s, the town has revisited the issue and has decided to pursue sewer lines so it can better handle wastewater management in the environmentally-sensitive shoreline area.

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Major Sewer Project Planned In Old Lyme