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Water Storage Improvement Projects
Access to clean water is vital to our community.
EWEB is hard at work making sure safe, reliable water continues to flow even as critical infrastructure ages and new challenges arise. In the next decade, we plan to construct new water storage facilities near 40th Ave. and Donald St. and replace the water storage systems at EWEB's College Hill and Hawkins Hill sites. The projects will be built to seismic and contemporary operating standards, providing more than 40 million gallons of resilient, safe water storage.
Dear College Hill Neighbors
For the past year or so, you have been hearing about plans to replace the 15 million-gallon (MG) College Hill Reservoir with new water storage infrastructure. Construction had been planned to begin mid-2023, but a recent decision by the EWEB Board of Commissioners to focus the utility's efforts on building two new tanks at another site has downstream effects for College Hill. 
Potential Timeline Changes for College Hill Reservoir Replacement

After serving Eugene for over 80 years, College Hill has reached the end of its useful life. The reservoir does not meet current seismic standards and requires significant, expensive repairs to protect the drinking water inside. Citing contamination concerns from leaking roof joints, the Oregon Health Authority (OHA) is requiring EWEB to rehabilitate or decommission College Hill by the end of 2023.

EWEB had originally planned to build one 7.5 million-gallon (MG) tank at an undeveloped property near E. 40th Ave, then begin work at College Hill before returning to the E. 40th site to construct a second tank.

However, the Board’s decision to construct two tanks concurrently at E. 40th, providing 15 MG of secure, reliable water storage by 2024, means that EWEB will have an opportunity to rethink the timing for rebuilding at College Hill. Read more about the E.40th project here.

We still plan to take College Hill out of service by the end of 2023, per OHA requirement, pending completion of the replacement storage at East 40th. But EWEB has not yet determined a new demolition and construction schedule for the concrete tank.

We will keep you informed as we continue to assess and refine the construction plan for College Hill. Watch for communication later this year with updates on the public engagement timeline for both historic mitigation and landscape design.

A third water storage project is also in the capital plan—building two new 7.5 MG tanks at Hawkins Hill to replace the existing 20 MG tank built in the 1960s. These interrelated projects are part of a significant investment aimed at diversifying EWEB’s water storage system with additional, but smaller tanks, to enhance resiliency, water quality, and systems operations.
Contact us with questions
Don't hesitate to reach out to the project team at 541-685-7899 or water.storage@eweb.org. Emails sent to this address will reach:

  • Laura Farthing, Project Manager/Senior Civil Engineer
  • Jen Connors, Communications Supervisor
  • Jeannine Parisi, Customer Relationship Manager
  • Wally McCullough, Water Engineering Supervisor
Project information and updates are available on our website eweb.org/waterstorage.