For about three weeks during September, and into early October, Munster residents experienced particularly offensive sewage odours wafting off the lagoons and irrigation spray field. The Lagoon Watchdog Committee received several calls from residents, especially from those within the first and second quadrants of Munster, and from commuters who travel south on the Munster Road, on their way to work.

One Munster resident who complained to the city, received a reply from a city official at the Robert Pickard Centre, that an "inversion" had taken place.

A non-city engineer was asked to verify this, and we were told that "inversions" usually happen in the spring. Just as the ice layer is melting off, some of the bottom sludge can get circulated to the surface, causing a severe stink downwind from the lagoons. (We certainly know this to be true, from a historical perspective.)

As to what would cause the stronger-than-usual stench at this time of year, the independent engineer suggested the most likely cause was that the fluid levels of the lagoons were pumped too low (in a possible attempt to reduce this winter's tank truck haulage), and that a little of the bottom sludge was mistakenly pumped through the irrigation system, and the sludge odour was carried by the wind off both the spray field and the abnormally low lagoon surfaces.

The engineer further stated that any use of a holding cell (lagoon) means that permanent retention of liquid is required, to cover solids and keep the smell reduced. Any consulting engineer who claims that an open lagoon/holding cell can be alternately filled and emptied, without generating serious odour problems, is just not telling the truth.

This is precisely why a lagoon (or "holding cell"), once it's started, can never be pumped to empty again, simply because the solids which settle to the bottom, if exposed to the air, liberate the type of odours we have just experienced.

It, therefore, makes sense that the Provincial Planning Policy states, sewage lagoons no longer have a place in a modern urban setting. We have to wonder why the archaic-minded application of lagoons, (with only a name change to "holding cell") ---in conjunction with an over-extended, high risk pipeline--- is being so ferociously pursued by the city, without a shred of land use planning, environmental or engineering logic to back it up. The whole concept of utilizing such an outrageously expensive, trouble-prone* forcemain/lagoon "solution" is already "a bust" before it even gets built.   *(Re: forcemain reliability problems: Five Richmond forcemain breaks, already)

In April (2002), a professionally designed survey, distributed and collected by resident-volunteers, was filled out by 73% of Munster households. Of that huge sampling (accurate to within ±2.9%, 19 times out of 20), 83% of the respondents stated that they wanted an on-site treatment plant at Munster, instead of the pipeline/lagoon contrivance. The main reason was that they wanted water to be treated in the watershed, and they wanted the lagoons to be decommissioned. (Survey Results)

So, why is the city ignoring all of this, and attempting to institute something which conflicts with the public interest, conflicts with its own Official Plan provisions (...from its official land use planning bible), conflicts with Provincial Planning Policy, and costs 500% more to build, does damage to the environment, and breaks just about every other "best business practice", in the modern field of sewage treatment and water conservation?

There are a few unsavory theories around …but no rational explanation for what the city is trying to do: Nor will the city's hired consultants be able to come up with one.

A long-time resident expressed to our committee, "The lagoon stink is quite embarrassing when friends come to visit. How do I explain why the city hasn’t fixed the problem, with a proper on-site treatment system …after all these years? For now, I tell them that the only thing worse than the lagoon stink, is the stench of all the political manipulation, interference and mishandling of the problem."