Volmarstein community waterworks

The community waterworks Volmarstein (GWV) is a waterworks on the Ruhr in the city of Wetter (Ruhr) in North Rhine-Westphalia. It is located on the southern " Volmarsteiner side" of the river near the border with Hagen - Vorhalle , but is still within the Wetter district (Alt-Wetter district). It should also be mentioned that in the early 1950s the pumps were still driven by steam engines. There was also a Lorenseilbahn cable car that transported the coal delivered by rail from the Volmarsteiner side to the waterworks in order to heat the steam boiler.

history

In the second half of the 19th century, the then independent city of Barmen , now a district of Wuppertal , was looking for a way to ensure that the population was supplied with drinking water . While the neighboring city of Elberfeld , also part of Wuppertal today, built a waterworks on the Rhine near Benrath , Barmen oriented itself towards the Ruhr. The city Barmen found in the Ruhr lowlands below the castle Volmarstein a good location to seven deep wells the bank filtrate to win the Ruhr, and built in 1882-83 or in 1877 at the same time a few hundred meters to the east the corresponding, at that time Barmer waterworks called plant .

The water was pumped two and a half kilometers through cast iron pipes with a diameter of 30 cm into the 130 meters higher Loh water tower in Volmarstein and from there found its way to the old Hatzfeld water tower in Barmen via further pipelines . But not only Barmen, which is over 15 kilometers away, benefited from the waterworks, the municipality of Volmarstein itself was also one of the first in the Ruhr Valley to be supplied with drinking water from a central spring.

Until 1988, Wuppertal used the drinking water from the Ruhr, but then did without the waterworks, as the city was able to supply itself through several dams ( Barmer dam , Kerspe dam and Große Dhünntalsperre ) and still by filtrate from the banks of the Rhine. The joint stock company for supply companies (AVU) of the Ennepe-Ruhr district , which had previously owned shares in the company Gemeinschaftswasserwerk Volmarstein GmbH , took it over completely in 1982. The old pipelines were replaced by new ones after 105 years and the cities of Schwelm , Gevelsberg and Wetter (Ruhr) are now supplied from the waterworks.

The Volmarstein communal waterworks is only used today when the AVU's Rohland waterworks cannot supply the entire supply area with drinking water. This is the case for around 15 percent of the year. Households in parts of Wetter and in Gevelsberg- Silschede will then be supplied by GWV. Due to a cooperation with Mark-E , this "emergency capacity" will no longer be needed in the future: As of 2019, the water networks of the two providers will be linked and one can support one another if necessary. The GWV will then be shut down and the areas on the southern bank of the Ruhr can be redesigned.

Cable suspension bridge weather at the waterworks

The iron construction of the company's own suspension bridge over the Ruhr, built in 1893, is a rare example of this type of construction in the history of technology.

Individual evidence

↑ Route of industrial culture : Volmarstein communal waterworks

^ ^A ^b Karl Hebecker: Hiking in weather. Freiherr-vom-und-zum-Stein-Weg. ed. from the city of Wetter (Ruhr), 2012.

^ AVU: Drinking water analysis. ( Page no longer available , search in web archives ) Info: The link was automatically marked as defective. Please check the link according to the instructions and then remove this notice. @1@ 2Template: Dead Link / www.avu.de (accessed October 2012).
↑ AVU: Drinking water - the precious liquid. ( Page no longer available , search in web archives ) Info: The link was automatically marked as defective. Please check the link according to the instructions and then remove this notice. @1@ 2Template: Dead Link / www.avu.de (accessed October 2012).
↑ ENERVIE: Safe drinking water supply for the region: Mark-E and AVU agree on cooperation - water supply network will be linked (accessed June 7, 2017).