Construction underway on $505M, 26-mile South Hillsborough Pipeline

With the population continuing to soar and a slew of new housing developments planned across the outermost corners of the formerly rural region, south Hillsborough County is getting a much needed gift from its water supplier this holiday season: a vital new pipeline for safe drinking water. 

Tampa Bay Water, the regional drinking water supplier for Hillsborough, Pasco and Pinellas counties, began construction earlier this month on the new, 26.5-mile South Hillsborough Pipeline needed to deliver clean drinking water to the fastest growing corner of the region, the agency says. It’s a $505.7 million project that’s funded in part by the Southwest Florida Water Management District and an $84.02 million infusion from Hillsborough County, records show. 

When finished, likely in late 2028, the pipeline will deliver up to 65 million gallons of fresh drinking water per day from Tampa Bay Water’s regional facility in Brandon to Hillsborough County’s southern service area at its Lithia Water Treatment Plant and a new facility in Balm that will be built by Hillsborough County.

The project is necessary to keep up with a growth surge, TBW spokesman Brandon Moore says. By 2045, the number of homes in Boyette is expected to increase by one-third, Wimauma will more than double and the Balm area will nearly triple, officials say. 

“It’s been 15 to 20 years since TBW has done a pipeline project of this magnitude, and this is still maybe the largest pipeline project we’ve ever done,” Moore says. “We have no authority over the growth that happens in any of our member counties, but our mandate is to make sure that they have drinking water to meet that growth.”

Construction crews began working on the first portions of the project earlier this month, closing lanes at the intersection of South Kings and West Bloomingdale avenues in Brandon to restripe and establish a new traffic pattern. Once that’s finished, crews will begin burrowing underneath Bloomingdale Avenue, excavating a tunnel pit and installing a five-foot diameter pipeline beneath the road.

South Hillsborough residents can expect construction in the area Monday through Saturday from 7 a.m. to 6 p.m. Temporary traffic patterns and lane closures will remain in place for about four months, says RaeChelle Davis, a communications official on the project.  

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The expansive pipeline is the result of an interlocal joint project agreement with Hillsborough County broken into two parts: Segment A, which was approved in September 2022 and Segment B, which was approved in January 2023 and will be paid for by Hillsborough County. The plan, Moore says, was selected from 10 alternatives using 11 criteria, including cost, permitting and environmental protection. 

The South Hillsborough Pipeline includes 17 tunnel crossings where construction crews will burrow underneath major roadways, railroads and the Alafia River, minimizing potential impacts to the environment, already congested traffic routes, like State Road 60, and major intersections.

TBW was fortunate to find two properties for sale on opposite sides of the Alafia River, eliminating the need to take over someone’s property under Florida’s eminent domain laws, Moore says. Hillsborough County property records show TBW purchased a 0.12 acre parcel at 4142 Alafia Blvd. for $489,600 and a 0.09 acre parcel at 7202 Alafia Ridge Road for $230,000. 

Crews will dig a pit on both sides of the river roughly 45 feet deep, lower tunneling equipment and push in pipe casing, then go back and insert the pipe, Moore says. All tunneling locations should be complete by Spring 2026. 

Other sections of the pipeline will be laid in “open cut” construction, where crews cut a trench in the middle of a roadway, install metal or concrete trench boxes and lay 25-foot sections of pipe at an average pace of 50 feet per day. TBW will have up to seven crews working on different sections of the pipeline at once to ensure the project stays on schedule. 

Traffic weighed heavily on the projected timeline for the project, Moore says. 

Two-way traffic will be maintained on Boyette Road at all times, and construction in front of Kingswood Elementary and Brandon High schools is scheduled for the summer. Construction crews will work at night on sections of the pipeline that intersect with large commercial corridors to minimize business disruptions and during the day access to businesses and homes will be maintained with temporary easements and help from a new addition to the project: full-time “Community Coordinators.”

Up to 16 Community Coordinators will staff construction sites 24 hours a day, seven days a week, Moore says, assisting residents with any potential issues such as access, parking, deliveries or garbage collection. Hired by Brandon-based contractor Garney Companies, the Community Coordinators will wear blue vests for easy identification and drive around the perimeter of the construction site on golf carts, Moore says. The agency, on hte communication front, has held 11 public meetings on the project this year. 

“It will be a challenge,” Moore says. “We can’t promise that there won’t be impacts but we can promise that we’ll communicate what all of those impacts are and we’ve already begun doing that.”