ORANGE BEACH, AL — Time was, Jeff Hartley says, the Orange Beach Sewer System had few options when it came to moving sewage to the city’s treatment plant.

Everything from beach road from the Waffle House east to the state line all went to Alabama 161, was pumped north to Canal Road, then west to Bill Silvers Parkway and to the treatment plant.

In the past, officials said, 70 percent of all sewage in Orange Beach took the Canal Road route to the treatment plant.

A direct line from Alabama 161 just south of city hall and through Gulf State Park to the plant relieved some of the pressure on the Canal Road line. That line was finished in early 2015.

Another line is planned from behind the Winn Dixie to connect with that new line. It will also go through the state park and involve lift stations at Sea Chase, Winn Dixie, Mariner Lakes and Walmart.

“We’re going to take Sea Chase and pump it to Winn Dixie, Mariner Lakes and pump it to Winn Dixie and now we’re going to take all that flow and tie it right in there,” Hartley, the city’s utilities director, said. “Then if we have any problems east of Sea Chase it won’t affect that area.”

Currently, Hartley said, Sea Chase’s station pumps to a station at Summer Chase at the intersection of beach road and Alabama 161. And there’s a line from the Winn Dixie station to Alabama 161 that serves Mariner Lakes and Walmart.

“We’re going to take Sea Chase and take it to Winn Dixie instead of taking it to Summer Chase at 161,” Hartley said. “But if we have a problem between Sea Chase and Winn Dixie we can still run it down the old way. It’s not the way we want to do it but in an emergency situation you can reroute the flow.”

The line from the Winn Dixie station to Alabama 161 will be shut down once the new line is complete, but it will still be available if a break elsewhere were to cause an emergency.

“By having it hooked up still we can still go down Canal if we have a problem here,” Hartley said. “Say Winn Dixie was having a problem and we had to go all the way around, we can do that. If it places the system in an emergency situation you can do what you’ve got to do. Before we had none of that.”

The first part of the $950,000 project will begin once the summer season is over and start with a bore underneath Alabama 161 from the Sea Chase station to the north side of the road by Hazel’s. It will be trenched from there to the Winn Dixie station.

Hartley said the city wants to get that part done before the state’s planned redo of Alabama 161 with new medians and designated left-turn areas. He hopes to start the project in October and be done by April.

Traffic concerns spurred the 2015 new line just south of City Hall, giving officials an alternative in case the state planned major construction projects on Canal Road, Hartley said. 

This new route is a way to relieve pressure and provide redundancy as the city continues to sprout condos and hotels. Single family housing and apartment building is also on the rise.

On beach road Best Western Premier The Tides at Cotton Bayou Beach access is almost ready with 60 new rooms. Two other hotels are planned on the city’s western edge on the north side of beach road, Indigo which will have 63 rooms and White Sands is planning 36.

Brett Robinson is doing the groundwork for Phoenix Orange Beach west of the Hampton Inn on the beach and will add 114 units. On the east side of the Hampton Inn the Gulf Coast Opportunity Fund has received the OK for 27-story Transcendence condominium with 166 units, but work there hasn’t started.

 “You want to make sure you’re able to handle anything that comes on line on beach highway,” Hartley said. “We’ve looked at all the zones now and we’ve calculated it out and we know what we need to do to take stress off the system.

“We’re getting back to isolating again and not pumping it twice. And it will give the capacity for the other units that are going in on beach highway.”

Hartley said added benefits for the new line are another fire break in Gulf State Park and when the line goes in east of Mariner Lakes work crews will address some drainage issues affecting that subdivision.