Chicago Flooding

A website tracks when sewage is dumped in the river. It will only increase with the fall rains.

The city braced for flooding and prepared an expanded paving program for pothole repair.

Albany Park flooding is a "priority" in the initiative, but river and lake runoff should improve as well.

Resident James Huffer said the "smelly cesspool" that formed at a clogged catch basin is a health hazard.

Plans have been in works for more than a year, but tunnel won't be finished until 2015, city estimated.

Engineering kept water levels low during torrential rains, experts said.

"Water started pouring in from the shower drains," said owner of one of 500 homes flooded in the area.

Second "100-year rain" in five years turned neighborhoods along the Chicago River into a disaster zone.

Take shorter showers, don't wash dishes and ease up on laundry, Water Reclamation District said.

Two weeks after a grand opening, the Damen Student Center's basement flooded during heavy rains.

Standing water blocked eastbound traffic as the evening commute approached.

MARK KONKOL: Sewer rain restrictors keep my basement from becoming a "poop swimming pool."