A group of stormwater professionals representing Oregon Department of Transportation (ODOT), City of Portland, City of Gresham, City of Lake Oswego, City of Eugene, and Clean Water Services convened to discuss stormwater challenges and ways to improve the management of large stormwater programs. This group agreed there are well-established protocol for evaluating the pollutant removal effectiveness of stormwater treatment technologies; however, no existing facilities or protocols had been developed to:

• Demonstrate a treatment technology’s ability to provide treatment over the long-term
• Determine how much maintenance effort is required for a treatment technology
• Quantify the cost to conduct that maintenance
• Determine the service life of a treatment technology (failure point)

Discussions by stakeholders and the ODOT Stormwater Retrofit committee yielded the concept of the STTC.

Protocols for evaluating maintenance requirements and life-cycle costs for stormwater treatment technologies were developed. A preliminary business plan was prepared to support the financially self-sustaining operation of the STTC and an appropriate location for the facility was identified. The ODOT Region 1 Tech Center took the lead in designing and overseeing construction of the STTC at the ODOT Maintenance Yard in Northeast Portland.

Construction of the STTC was completed in 2016. Calibration and preliminary testing was conducted throughout the winter of 2016/2017.

Starting in early 2018, the business plan for the STTC was updated with input from the STTC’s Board of Directors in preparation for opening the center for full operation and testing of stormwater treatment technologies in the fall of 2018.