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Council approves road-level diversion at East Hawthorne roundabout to redirect stormwater
Summary
Homewood City Council approved a plan to install a raised roadway diversion at the East Hawthorne roundabout in Lynnwood intended to keep stormwater in the street and route it to a downstream inlet rather than into a nearby driveway and garage.
Homewood City Council on June 16 approved a plan to install a raised road diversion at the roundabout at East Hawthorne in the Lynnwood neighborhood to redirect stormwater away from a private driveway and garage.
Council members heard from presenters who said the inlet at the roundabout and the downstream pipe are undersized and cannot handle recent heavy rains. Councilors and staff described the proposed measure as a raised berm or curved surface in the roadway that would keep water in the street and route it to a larger downstream inlet and ultimately to a creek, instead of allowing concentrated flows into a homeowner's driveway.
Presenters said the pipe serving the current inlet is too small to accommodate peak flows and that the diversion is intended as an affordable, interim measure. A presenter estimated the diversion would channel roughly two-thirds of stormwater coming from the north away from the affected driveway. Council members asked whether vehicles could pass and whether the feature would require follow-up regrading when the street is repaved; staff said vehicles would be able to drive over or around the raised surface and that full street resurfacing in the future could remove the need for the measure.
Council discussion also covered community notification and engineering review. One council member requested that staff speak with adjacent property owners before referral to full council; another said the committee could move forward with the work and evaluate its effectiveness after installation, removing the diversion if it did not perform as intended. The council made the approval conditional on the usual permitting process.
The transcript records a motion to approve the work to divert water and a second; the chair called for a vote. The vote was announced in the meeting as "4 2 1" (transcript) and the council proceeded to the next agenda item.
The measure was presented as a localized, low-cost response rather than a stormwater master-plan project; staff noted the route would rely on existing downstream infrastructure. Council members said they would monitor the installation and, if necessary, remove or adjust it after evaluation.
