$251 million going into fixing Tampa's stormwater troubles
TAMPA (FOX 13) - It's the construction before the storm. Tampa is spending more than $251 million to fix flood-prone spots across the city.
In 2015, two weeks after Marc Holt bought his Manhattan Avenue home, he was welcomed to South Tampa with heavy rains and severe flooding.
“This one was kinda bad and just never ever, ever stopped,” he said. “I counted in my front yard 20 cars that were floating."
That was an extreme case. But Holt lives in an area that routinely gets high water after a storm.
"I always get flooding, any time it rains, any at all, I get flooding in the front here up into the yard. Debris floats by down Manhattan," Holt said.
A section of the roadway is shut down right now, while crews work to upgrade the system and alleviate that flooding.
It's just one of Tampa's trouble spots. City leaders blame an aging and undersized stormwater system for a lot of the issues.
Now, more than $251 million is being spent on dozens of construction jobs across the city to fix flood-prone areas.
"Many of the projects involve either adding additional pipes, extending pipes, or increasing the size of the pipes that we have there already,” Tampa’s director of transportation and stormwater services, Jean Duncan, said. “And that does allow more stormwater flow to go through the system and drain where it should go instead of sitting in the streets, going in people's homes and businesses."
Two massive design-build projects in the works will make a significant impact in South Tampa. The plans target spots that are frequently under water and attacks the severe, chronic flooding along Dale Mabry Highway between Henderson Boulevard and Neptune Street.
It's work that could take a while but for many folks, the temporary headaches are worth it if the water stops backing up.
“For me, honestly, I’ll put up with whatever they're doing, I know they're working diligently six days a week to get the project done," said Holt.
If you want more details about the city's many projects to improve stormwater, visit https://atg.tampagov.net/sirepub/cache/2/5mmwnjdrlxwp5q2byprhjrfr/506926404192018094135252.PDF