Cedar Brook floods after storm

Soccer fields yesterday, looking toward Stelle Avenue from Randolph Road.

 

Except for those who live in or travel through the Cedar Brook Park area, most Plainfielders are probably blissfully unaware of the engineering marvel that keeps Plainfield from getting flooded when rainstorms like yesterday's hit the city.

Schematic shows flood-prone areas in blue.

An enormous storm sewer gathers runoff which rises in the First Ward after rainstorms, channeling it southwestward through the city, underneath Berckman Street to the south side of the railroad tracks eventually passing both Evergreen and Plainfield High schools to pour into the Cedar Brook channel behind the high school, spilling into Cedar Brook Park.

Here the brook passes under Stelle Avenue bridge, which it sometimes spills over.

The flooding of the soccer fields and the cricket pitch help make sure that homes elsewhere in the city are not flooded.

Am including a couple of pix taken during and after yesterday afternoon's cloudburst.

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-- Dan Damon [follow]

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