Toward a healthy harbor

Once dubbed the filthiest harbor in America, Boston Harbor has made an extraordinary recovery thanks to a regional system of undersea tunnels, treatment facilities and even the world's largest anaerobic sludge digester. And by implementing strict controls, managers have shaved nearly $700 million from the original project cost. Nine years into one of the largest environmental construction projects ever undertaken in the US, the Boston Harbor now has clearer, cleaner and better smelling waters. Fecal coliform levels and zinc and copper loadings are down at least 75% from the early 1980s, and pesticides and disease in shellfish and winter flounder are reduced. Native marine life has even returned. In fact, the Boston Harbor cleanup has been successful enough that Congress recently added the harbor's islands to the National Park System.