Caloosahatchee Connect project finally complete

Reporter: Asha Patel Writer: Matias Abril
Published: Updated:
Caloosahatchee
Caloosahatchee Connect project. CREDIT: WINK News

A moment a decade in the making is finally here. The Caloosahatchee Connect project is finally complete.

WINK News attended the celebratory ribbon-cutting ceremony Thursday morning. The completion of this project means clean water for the Cape all year round.

“We started this project over 10 years ago, and now it’s at final completion,” said Jeff Pearson, Utilities Director in Cape Coral.

Fort Myers and Cape Coral city leaders cut the ribbon for the Caloosahatchee Connect project Thursday morning.

This large reclaimed water pipeline allows Cape Coral to transfer up to 12 million gallons of water daily from Fort Myers.

“This reclaimed water actually saves our residents millions of dollars each year versus using drinking water to irrigate your lawn and your landscaping every year. This project continues to pay dividends to our customers,” Pearson said.

The goal of this pipeline is not only for irrigation but also for fire protection and maintaining the canals during the dry season. City leaders from both Fort Myers and Cape Coral are glad they could team up for this new way of reusing water.

“We work with the city of Fort Myers on their discharge,” said Michael Ilczyszyn, Cape Coral city manager. “We were able to negotiate an agreement that had us purchasing the water discharging to the environment so, provided them a financial capability to improve the wastewater plan, and allowed us to take the water out the river, and it’s going to be utilized here in the city of Cape Coral,”

The Caloosahatchee Connect project pipeline runs more than 7,000 feet.

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