Rhine-See Canal

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The Rhine-See Canal was a canal planned around 1900 from the Rhine to the German North Sea coast . At the beginning of the 20th century, many new waterway connections were planned. These included the Main-Werra Canal , the Neckar-Danube Canal and a canal from the Rhine to the North Sea.

Josef Rosemeyer from Cologne, engineer and former director of a large electricity company, presented a plan in 1912 to build a canal from Cologne to Ditzum . Initial plans envisaged a canal from Wesel to Ditzum. The construction of this canal was intended to create a direct connection from the Rhine to the German North Sea ports.

The canal planned by Rosemeyer should be 279 km long and have a mirror width of 70 meters, a floor width of 30 meters and a depth of 8 meters. With these dimensions it would have been possible to travel to Cologne by seagoing vessels. In addition to a shorter journey, reloading in Rotterdam would also have been omitted.

Course of the canal

The canal should branch off from the Rhine at the mouth of the Wupper near Wiesdorf , run east past Düsseldorf and cut through the area between Duisburg and Oberhausen . A connecting canal with a descent lock was planned to the Duisburg ports. In the further course a canal to Wesel and Rees was to be built near Hünxe , which flowed back into the Rhine there. This canal would have needed two descent locks.

Other cities along the canal were Dinslaken , Schermbeck , Raesfeld , Borken , Gronau and Haren . In Emsbüren , Meppen and cold Tange were sluices with hydroelectric power plants provided. The first two locks should each overcome a height difference of 12.97 m, the last 11.40 m. The canal should be built without a slope up to the first lock. A flood protection gate was planned at the branch of the Rhine.

In his planning, Rosemeyer worked out and calculated eight different variants of the canal.

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