Alb water supply

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Monument to the main engineers of the Alb water supply in Blaubeuren

The Alb water supply was a pioneering hydraulic engineering achievement, the implementation of which began in 1870. For the first time, it ensured the supply of clean drinking water for the inhabitants of the plateau of the Swabian Alb in the Kingdom of Württemberg , which is characterized as a karst area by water poverty .

Water shortage on the Alb plateau

The Swabian Alb is the largest contiguous karst area in Germany. The falling precipitation quickly seeps into the crevices and crevices of the limestone and emerges via underground systems of watercourses and caves on the edge of the Alb plateau as sometimes powerful springs (a well-known example is the Blautopf near Blaubeuren ). Therefore, there is hardly any surface water on the plateau of the Swabian Alb , although the average annual rainfall is around 800 to 1000 mm. The supply of clean drinking water to the population was therefore a permanent problem. In addition to cisterns or roof wells, so-called shells , mostly artificial ponds sealed with clay, were used to collect rainwater . The hygienic conditions of the water running off the roofs as well as the water collected in the shells were correspondingly inadequate. In addition to their function as a fire water tank and cattle trough, cooking water also had to be taken from them in times of emergency. Contemporary reports confirm the state of the water:

Woe to the stranger who, in one of the primitive Alb villages, where the thatched roofs predominate and one is solely dependent on rainwater, has a need for a glass of water. (...) The water that trickles down from the thatched roofs has turned straw yellow to coffee brown. Only those who have grown accustomed to the sight of this water can put the glass to their lips without disgust.

The following was often the case for the water in the hulls

They generally have very unclean, stinking and disgusting water, and look like large pools of crap because all the rubbish flows into it… .

Transporting clean water by cart in barrels from the springs 150 to 300 meters deeper in the valley was difficult, especially in winter over icy roads.

Construction of the water supply

Early attempts

The first attempts with pressure lines on the Alb were made as early as the 17th and 18th centuries, but they only served a selective supply, e.g. a delivery line to Hellenstein Castle near Heidenheim an der Brenz, built in 1606 and destroyed again in the Thirty Years' War . Since 1715, the so-called water art , a pressure pipe over 130 m height difference, led to St. Johann (Württemberg) . It was not until the 19th century, however, that suitable techniques for the production of pumps or casting processes for pipes that could permanently withstand the necessary water pressure at an even higher delivery head became available. From 1830 to 1838, on the initiative of Professor Friedrich August Quenstedt from Tübingen , boreholes were carried out on the Alb plateau, but only in three out of ten cases hit water at a depth of 43 to 67 meters, the amount of which, however, was not sufficient for supply purposes (this would be about 200 meters deep Drilling required).

Karl Ehmann's plans

Karl Ehmann (1827–1889)

In 1866, the engineer and building officer Karl Ehmann (1827-1889) presented the Württemberg Royal Ministry of the Interior with a plan for the water supply of the communities on the Alb, in the form of "technical preliminary investigations with a plan on the efficiency of an artificial water supply for the Alborte of the kingdom". Ehmann had already gained experience in hydraulic engineering, including in England and the USA. According to his plans, eight pumping stations in river valleys were to feed elevated tanks on the Alb via pressure lines, from which - in order to save costs - several communities (initially 60 were planned) were to be supplied with water via hydrants and house connections. While the ministry supported his project from the start, the Alb communities initially rejected it as unrealistic or too expensive.

First implementation step

The Schmiech at the first Albwasserversorgung pumping station in Teuringshofen

The communities of Justingen , Ingstetten and Hausen then played a pioneering role, and in 1869 approved the construction of the first "Alb group" near Schelklingen , which was supposed to supply 1,320 residents. The events surrounding this building were later reflected in the historical novel Der Schultheiss von Justingen by Josef Weinberg , published in 1936 . He particularly emphasizes the role of Justinger Schultheißen Anton Fischer, who as a veterinarian recognized the connections between unclean water and various diseases. Construction began in May 1870. As early as February 18, 1871, “the most wonderful water flowed out of a number of stately fountain tubes with real celebration of the population”. This later group VIII pumped the Schmiech water from Teuringshofen into a pressure vessel near Justingen. A water wheel with a diameter of 5.8 meters drove two piston pumps . This first pumping station for the Alb water supply is now a technical monument.

The further expansion

Map of the Alb water supply, as of 1881

After this success, other communities quickly joined, and by 1876 five supplies had already been completed, supplying 17,000 people with 12,320 hectoliters of water a day . In 1881 Groups II to IX were in operation. Karl Ehmann was supported in particular by his cousin Hermann Ehmann (1844–1905), who continued his work even after Karl's retirement. In 1923 there were finally 23 groups that supplied 295 settlements with around 100,000 people.

With the exception of supply group VIII, where river water was used directly, the water was mainly taken from the large karst springs of the deep valleys or from the gravel of the floodplain. The improved water quality was reflected in a decrease in death rates from typhoid fever and , in the case of cattle, from bovine tuberculosis .

The construction of the Alb water supply also received international attention and was, for example, a topic at the Vienna World Exhibition in 1873 or the International Exhibition for Health Care in Brussels.

Plan by Karl Ehmann: Eybtal pumping station (Albgruppe II) with tangential wheel, a turbine precursor

In the following decades, technical modifications and changes were made again and again. Originally a per capita water consumption of 70–80 liters per day (plus consumption by the cattle) was planned, which had to be adjusted to the later growing consumption. Piston pumps driven by water wheels or turbines were originally used throughout for pumping. Later the piston pumps were increasingly replaced by centrifugal pumps, the water wheels and turbines by more modern turbines, steam engines, combustion or electric motors.

The now good water supply of the Swabian Alb is based to this day on the performance of Ehmann, whereby a network with other supplies in southwest Germany has taken place, such as the state water supply and the Lake Constance water supply .

literature

Web links

Individual evidence

  1. ↑ Oscar Fraas : The Alb water supply in the Kingdom of Württemberg , 1873, cited above. after Winfried Müller: 125 years of Albwasserversorgung , Hinderer Verlag, Korntal 1995, ISBN 3-9801639-3-8 .
  2. ↑ Oberamtsbeschreibung Münsingen 1825, quoted in Ernst Waldemar Bauer , Helmut Schönnamsgruber (Hrsg.): The great book of the Swabian Alb . Konrad Theiss, Stuttgart 1988, ISBN 3-8062-0236-2 .
  3. ^ Josef Weinberg: Der Schultheiss von Justingen , 1936. Reprint: Verl. Rainer C. Feucht, Allmendingen, 1987, ISBN 3-88708-110-2 .
  4. ↑ quoted from Georg Wagner: Die Schwäbische Alb , Essen, Burkhard-Verlag, 1959, p. 195
  5. ↑ Müller, pp. 44-55.