The Eastern Avenue Pumping Station
Infrastructure Incognito
Completed in 1915, the Eastern Avenue Pumping Station is a working part of Baltimore City's sanitation system. The building is a designated landmark, and pumps some 25 million gallons of sewage each day to the Back River Wastewater Treatment Plant.
Do you live or work downtown? Then everytime you wash your hands or flush the commode, that dirty water travels right through this building, on its way to an intensive cleaning process, then to nature in Back River.
The original pumps were steam-driven, and five stories tall!
Coal-powered boilers that made the steam to drive the pumps were located in the back. This picture shows where barges could pull right up and unload their coal by conveyor, into giant storage bins in the roof. Coal then trickled into the boiler fires to keep the steam going.
In the 1960's, the steam pumps and boilers were removed and replaced with sleek new electric pumps.
In 1982, the City's Department of Public Works turned the old boiler room into a public works museum and built Streetscape, where the public could come and see artifacts and learn about public works.
Today, visitors can learn about public works at the PWE, and tours of the working pump station can also be arranged. And, in the coming years, some big improvements are coming - both to the pump station and PWE!