SAFE, SHINEY, RESILIENT,
NEW LIFT STATION UNVEILED
2025 April 14
NEW LIFT STATION UNVEILED
2025 April 14
The first of seventeen lift stations, carrying Cedar Key household sewage to the Third Street wastewater processing plant, is now complete and ready for placement back online.
The multi-million dollar effort was made possible by the Florida legislature, with lobbying by the Cedar Key Water Sewer District, the City of Cedar Key, and more than fifteen Cedar Key based non-profit organizations, such as Audubon and Florida’s Nature Coast Conservancy.
The lift station located on the northwest corner of the Hawthorne and Gulf Boulevard intersection was visited by the full Cedar Key Water and Sewer District Board on Monday, April 14, 2025, at 4 pm. Greeting them and explaining the complexities of the construction were CKWSD General Manager John Rittenhouse, Retired CKWSD Superintendent James McCain, and subcontractor from Baskerville Donavan Engineering, Cody Sutterfield.
Since February, while working on the Hawthorne / Gulf lift station, Sutterfield’s team has been working on several other stations. Of those, the stations on State Road 24 across from the Blue Marina and the one on Palmetto Road are “99% ready to operate,” reported Sutterfield.
The lift station was a hole in the ground containing pipes, valves, and electronic control boards, which access to required CKWSD staff and technicians to enter, descend, control, reset, and monitor…among noxious, toxic gases therein.
Now, the hole in the ground is transformed into an approximately six diameter by sixteen feet deep concrete encased pit that collects sewage from areas as far away as Hodgson Hill. Pipes from the underground enclosure are now directed above ground. The electronic control panel, ow placed more than six feet above ground, is more resilient, more able to survive storm waters. Also, six feet up are the generator and the cellular connector.
Kudos to the Cedar Key Wate and Sewer District for shearing this Herculean and critical project.
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