WAPPINGER – The water tunnel drilled 700 feet below the Hudson River between the Town of Newburgh on the west and Wappinger on the east has been completed.
The Delaware Aqueduct Bypass Tunnel is the first tunnel built under the Hudson River since 1957, when the south tube of the Lincoln Tunnel was completed.
The New York City Department of Environmental Protection has monitored two leaking sections of the Delaware Aqueduct, one in the Town of Newburgh and the other in the Town of Wawarsing, since the early 1990s. The leaks release some 20 million gallons of water per day, about 95 percent of which escapes the tunnel through the leak near the Hudson River in Newburgh.
In 2010, New York City announced the plan to repair the aqueduct by building the bypass tunnel around the leaking section in Newburgh and also by grouting closed the smaller leaks in Wawarsing.
The project began in 2013 with the excavation of two vertical shafts in Newburgh and Wappinger to gain access to the subsurface. The shafts, 845 and 675 feet deep respectively, were completed in 2017. Since then a giant tunnel boring machine has been excavating rock, which is brought to the surface by underground trains and a large crane.
The Delaware Aqueduct will remain in service while the bypass tunnel is constructed. Once completed, the existing tunnel will be taken out of service and excavation will begin to connect the bypass tunnel to structurally and sound portions of the aqueduct.
While the Delaware Aqueduct is shut down, work crews will also enter the aqueduct in Wawarsing to seal the small leaks there, roughly 35 miles northwest of the bypass tunnel.
