WATER TREATMENT PLANT ON SCHEDULE, PLANT’S TRANSMISSION MAIN BEING INSTALLED
Construction of the City of Raleigh’s Dempsey E. Benton Treatment Plant remains on schedule, with completion set for February 2010. The $90.5 million plant is being constructed on 55 acres near Lake Benson, off of N.C. 50 (Benson Road) at Buffaloe Road, south of Garner.
Crews are currently installing the plant’s transmission main that will carry up to 20 million gallons of water a day to the City’s service areas. The 48-inch diameter main is being constructed in three phases at a cost of $23 million. When complete, the transmission main will be eight miles long and extend from the Dempsey E. Benton Water Treatment Plant north along Highway 50 ending at Wilmington Street, just south of the Raleigh City Limits. It will connect to an existing 30-inch diameter water transmission main for distribution to City of Raleigh water customers.
Construction of the new water treatment plant’s transmission main is scheduled to be complete in November. The work began last January.
The new plant is named for Dempsey E. Benton, who served as Raleigh’s city manager from 1983-2000. The City broke ground on the facility on April 11, 2007.
The Dempsey E. Benton Water Treatment Plant will allow the City of Raleigh to meet the area’s future water needs by providing additional water system reliability and capacity. The City will continue to operate the E.M. Johnson Water Treatment Plant in north Raleigh after the Dempsey E. Benton plant opens.
The City of Raleigh is the single largest provider of potable water in the Triangle, serving Wake County residents through 175,000 metered connections to 435,000 customers in Raleigh and the towns of Garner, Rolesville, Wake Forest, Knightdale, Wendell and Zebulon.