What Do Those Mysterious Pipes and Vents Along New Jersey Roads Do?

They've been there for decades but you probably have never paid much attention to them.

Along the sides of many roads in New Jersey, you'll find metal poles that look like they're for street signs, but there's nothing mounted to them. They usually just blend into their surroundings.

But there is one unique feature to these poles: there's a vent on top.

So what do they do? Quite a bit, actually.

Simply put, without those vents, life in the Garden State would be a lot less pleasant.

I recently found myself driving down West Jersey Avenue in Egg Harbor Township and after passing several of those poles and vents, it got me thinking about what they really do.

I figured that the vent was obviously a vent for something (quite an assumption on my part) -- but for what exactly?

For the answer, I took a shot in the dark and reached out to Tom Ganard, chief engineer for the Atlantic County Utilities Authority (ACUA), who was a wealth of knowledge about the topic.

Turns out, those vents in particular are for the ACUA's sanitary sewer force mains which carry domestic sewage from various parts of the county to the big wastewater treatment plant in Atlantic City (where the five giant windmills are).

The purpose of the vents is to prevent air from building up in the lines which would ultimately reduce the flow capacity within that line. They are located at the high points of the force mains, which is where the buildup of air will occur.

So, without those vents, life would be unpleasant.

But what if there were no vents?

Ultimately the capacity within the pipeline would be reduced and/or potential interior degradation of the pipeline itself due to the buildup of hydrogen sulfide gases.

So not only would life be unpleasant, but it would be yucky, to say the least.