u/SaveTheAlewifeBrook

The state’s response to sewage flooding at Alewife Brook? A sandwich board.

Yesterday, Massachusetts Water Resources Authority put up warning signs along the Alewife Brook bike path telling people they may be walking through raw sewage floodwater.

Every year, MWRA, Somerville and Cambridge dump millions of gallons of untreated sewage through six raw sewage combined sewer overflows into Alewife Brook. This isn’t some remote area. About 5,000 people live in the brook’s 100-year floodplain, which already floods regularly.

And we’re still building. Cambridge is planning a $4B development tied into the same Combined Sewer Overflow system. Somerville is adding dense affordable housing right across Route 16. Thousands more gallons of sewage is planned to discharge into the brook from new development, daily.

The kicker: MWRA has the financial capacity to fix this through bonded infrastructure work without massive rate hikes. But no one wants to take on sewer separation at Alewife Brook. The current plan from Cambridge and Somerville is 0.1% sewer separation. That means a lot more raw sewage in the brook in the future due to Climate Change.

Instead of solving the problem, the state puts up warning signs along the brook telling people they’re about to walk through sewage, while climate change brings heavier rain and worse flooding.

Thank you to the Globe and to writer Dave McGlinchey for shining some light on this and publishing this piece. <3

Instead of funding construction of undersized storage tanks that do not scale with increase of rainfall from climate change, this Environmental Bond Bill amendment (#421) directs the money toward actual sewer separation infrastructure in Cambridge and Somerville. That means designing and building systems that reduce and ultimately eliminate sewage discharges into the brook, rather than just holding overflow during smaller storms.

This creates a joint grant program for the cities of Cambridge and Somerville focused specifically on CSO reduction in the Alewife watershed.

Sewer separation is the best solution and that requires time and money. But it's a regional problem that requires regional funding.

Note that MWRA has the bonding capacity and the budget for the debt service on those bonds to pay for projects to end sewage pollution at Alewife Brook. And that's without crushing households with shocking rate increases.

We also want to thank the Mystic River Watershed Association for their work with Senator Jehlen, on the senate side of the bill. We deeply appreciate what our friends in the State House are doing here.

Hello Wastewater Friends,

The Massachusetts Water Resources Authority has created a new draft “updated” Long-Term CSO Control Plan. You may be aware of the Boston Harbor Cleanup, which resulted in huge improvements to water quality in the Boston Harbor. The new Updated LTCP is in planning, a decade following the completion of the Harbor CSO and Deer Island WWTP projects. For decades now, the MWRA has been smartly managed financially. The bonds that were issued by MWRA to pay for the first Harbor Cleanup projects are expiring. So now MWRA has the capacity to issue new bonds and *already* has the budget to pay for the debt service on those bonds. That said, and it had to be said - cuz you know it always comes down to money… MWRA’s new draft updated LTCP is arguing against eliminating untreated CSOs in a heavily developed, flood-prone area. It flooded five times in 2023. (This area, interestingly enough, is also home to Massachusetts Governor Maura Healey. And don’t you know there’s > $4 billion in housing development planned in the next decade, to be hooked up to this same sewer system that discharges to six untreated CSOs.) The MWRA’s argument is that stormwater is more of a problem than raw CSO / sewage. MWRA looked at the indicator pathogen (E-coli) and showed that E Coli is present in stormwater, as well. MWRA uses that to discount the fact that there are many more hazardous pathogens in raw sewage than exists in stormwater. It’s a frustrating sleight-of-hand technique that they know will confuse people. My questions: Does anyone here have a comprehensive list of hazardous pathogens that exist in raw sewage? Can you share some good photos of the gross things that you’ve seen in raw sewage? Worms, whatever ya got. Thanks in advance. FWIW: we’re advocating for sewer separation and large green Stormwater infrastructure (stormwater wetlands) on state parkland, to be funded by MWRA.

UPDATE: My friend is talking fine and doing OK and will hopefully be a lot better in a few days. Thanks to everyone here, especially the person who shared the police and fire reports. We don’t think it was a hit and run, but we don’t know what happened yet. The police will be able to help because there *was* a report filed. Super scary. Hi my friend got hit by a car today (5/19) at around noon and doesn’t remember anything. She’s in the ER at MGH now. Let me know if you saw this happen or if you called an ambulance or if you know anything. We are trying to figure out what happened. TIA

Department of Conservation and Recreation's Rick Reynolds

For more photos of the event: https://savethealewifebrook.org/2026/05/10/alewife-earth-day-2026/