Starting with a look at the incredible growth of the Green City, Clean Waters program over the last five years and finishing with a Q&A that explores a storm flood relief project blending green and traditional infrastructure investments, we had an exciting (and busy) Infrastructure Week here at Philadelphia Water.

One of the core goals of Infrastructure Week is to start a conversation that gets people thinking about the ways in which things like water mains, highways, bridges and more don’t just “matter” in our everyday lives—they make our everyday lives possible.

We looked at the busy crews who clean close to 300 storm drains each day, working double shifts to make sure we’re getting the best drainage possible at our inlets every time it rains.

Commissioner McCarty was joined by two very good friends of drinking water—Water Woman and Spokesdog Shorty—as she unveiled four new innovative drinking water stations and highlighted Philly’s tap water as an affordable, environmentally friendly and healthy alternative to packaged, waste-intensive drinks like soda and bottled water.

Our Throwback Thursday post looked at the 200-year-old foundations of our water infrastructure, as seen through the fascinating and beautiful Frederick Graff Collection, which was just made available online and captures the drawings and maps of Philadelphia’s first true drinking water engineer.

We got an inside look at the ongoing, $17 million revamp of our 113-year-old Belmont Raw Water Basin, an important piece of a complex drinking water treatment process that ensures a million and half people can have constant access to crystal clear, top-quality water in their homes. (Be sure to check out the slideshows of photos from 1901-03 and from the ongoing renovation for a cool now vs. then perspective.)

Through graphics and video shared on our social media sites, we explored the miles of sewer replaced every year and the hundreds of millions of dollars invested in protecting and improving our drinking water infrastructure:

 

If your shares, retweets, likes and comments are any indication, we think we did indeed get people talking and thinking about how much water infrastructure matters in our daily lives.

 

That’s extremely important to us, because we count on your support and the funding provided by water bills for everything that we do. Unlike many types of infrastructure, the systems that make sure you have water that’s safe to drink, that our rivers are clean and that our streets don’t flood, is completely funded by you, the customer.

Thank you to all who followed along and shared our stories during Infrastructure Week 2016. And, if you missed our posts, you’re in the right place to catch up!

As a parting gift, we present to you a great collection of photos from Friday’s water station ribbon cutting:
Water Station Ribbon Cutting 2016