Northwest Side Superfund River Cleanup Nears Completion

[excerpted from the Journal-Sentinel]

Twenty-five years after the old Moss-American wood-preserving plant was placed on the nation's Superfund priority cleanup list, federal officials said Friday the work is nearly done at an estimated cost of $37 million.

This Superfund site stretches across the northwest corner of Milwaukee, encompassing a six-mile stretch of the Little Menomonee River from the former 88-acre factory at W. Brown Deer and N. Granville roads downstream to W. Hampton Ave.

Dredging contaminated mud from the river bed near the Appleton Ave. bridge - the final piece to be cleaned up - will be done within two weeks, said Ross del Rosario, remedial project manager for the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency in Chicago.

Rains Thursday and Friday halted work temporarily, he said.

The strategy for remediating pollution in the river included a remedy rarely used by the EPA: rerouting the stream around the heaviest contamination.

From 2002 to 2005, a new channel was dug for the river between W. Brown Deer and W. Mill roads. Pollutants were not left in place.

More than 26,000 tons of heavily contaminated sediment was dug out of the former streambed in that stretch and disposed of at a hazardous waste landfill in Illinois.

Since August of this year, more than 3,000 tons of slightly tainted muck has been dredged from the streambed from an area a few hundred feet upstream of Appleton Ave. down to a bend in the river about 1,000 feet south of W. Silver Spring Drive, del Rosario said.

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