Unseen City: The R.C. Harris Water Treatment Plant 20101119RCH021

Unseen City: The R.C. Harris Water Treatment Plant

A view of the filtration building from outside. The scaffolding is related to R.C. Harris’ building envelope rehabilitation project, which will see the complex’s roofs and walls repaired.

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: A view of the filtration building rotunda.

: The pump house (front) and service building (rear), with part of the filtration building visible in the distance.

: R.C. Harris’ original control room, now disused because it’s far too large for the modern computers that currently regulate plant’s systems. The windows overlook the pump room.

: Brilliant told us that these pumps have been in service for as long as the plant itself, owing to their exceptionally solid construction.

: An underground corridor connecting the service building to the filtration building.

: In the filtration building laboratory, ten faucets continuously pour water drawn from different phases of the filtration process. This water is used to calibrate instruments.

: This clocklike structure, in the filtration building rotunda, is not actually entirely a clock. This face DOES tell time, but the rest display water levels in various areas of the plant.

: The rotunda has a dramatic domed ceiling.

: A view down one of the filtration building’s two main corridors.

: Filtration bed controls. These manual handles are used only in emergencies. The plant is controlled by computer.

: Filtration beds, flooded with lake water that has been treated with a coagulant to clump up impurities and make them easier to strain out.

: This is what the filtration beds look like when drained of water. The black stuff is charcoal. The trough-like structures above the charcoal are backwash channels, used when the beds are flooded from underneath for cleaning.

: When the filtration beds are cleaned, the water used in the cleaning is sluiced down into a new underground residue treatment facility, where this massive pipe is located

: In the underground facility are ten storage tanks, like this one, where wastewater is allowed to sit for several hours, until the majority of the dirt settles to the bottom. The dirtiest water is held for more processing, and the rest is pumped back into Lake Ontario, from whence it came.

: Each tank can hold more than a million litres.

: A stairwell in the underground treatment facility.

: Another tank.

: “It gives you an open sort of feeling. You don’t feel like you’re underground,” said Brilliant of his plant’s new underground facility.

: These centrifuges separate the dirt from the water collected from the bottoms of the wastewater tanks.

: Once centrifuged out, the residual dirt is deposited into these waste containers. It looks like wet sand, which is basically what it is.

: A view of the filtration building from outside. The scaffolding is related to R.C. Harris’ building envelope rehabilitation project, which will see the complex’s roofs and walls repaired.