The New York City Department of Environmental Protection says it has reached the halfway point of a 2.5-mile tunnel being drilled from Newburgh to Wappinger that will connect on both sides to the 85-mile Delaware Aqueduct, which links four Catskill reservoirs with the city.
The project, projected to cost $1 billion and continue through 2023, will allow the DEP to bypass portions of the Delaware tunnel that are leaking beneath the Hudson River so they can be repaired.
The tunnel is being created by a boring machine that has been dubbed Nora, for Nora Barney, the first woman in the U.S. to earn an engineering degree. The bore is presently about a half mile west of the Hudson.
Photos courtesy NYC Water