A City at Work: Images from the Seattle Municipal Archives Photo Collection

Sewers & Drainage: Introduction

Prior to 1890, Seattle relied on a haphazard assortment of sewers and cesspools that, at best, drained into surrounding lakes and salt water. Faced with recurring threats of waterborne diseases including typhoid and cholera, City Engineer Benezette Williams designed the Seattle's first centralized combined sewage system plan in 1891. This plan sought to remove as much city sewage as possible into the salt water of Elliott Bay and the Puget Sound with more limited drainage into the fresh water of Lake Washington. Although originally untreated, the City undertook a succession of steps starting in the late 1910's to remove solids, begin primary sewage treatment, and eventually separate storm water from raw sewage. Metropolitan King County took over the City's wastewater treatment responsibilities in the 1960's, but Seattle continues to manage its network of storm sewers.

53rd Avenue S.W. Wood Stave Pipe Outfall Extension, 1934. [Item No: 38677]

The Photograph Collection contains includes more than 6,000 sewer facility images viewable from the Photograph Collection Index. The Archives holds thousands more post-1960 storm sewer construction photos in its Engineering Department Negatives Collection (most as part of the Forward Thrust bond levy), searchable by visiting the Seattle Municipal Archives.

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