Silo channel

Silo channel
	View into the silo channel from the west
abbreviation	SiK
location	Brandenburg on the Havel
Built	until 1920
Beginning	lower Beetzsee
The End	Confluence with the Quenzsee
Ports	City harbor , city marina
Historical precursors	Silo trenches
Ascent	eastbound
Competent authority	Brandenburg Waterways and Shipping Office
	Shipping routes around and through Brandenburg at the respective times

The Silokanal (SiK) in the state of Brandenburg is a section of the federal waterway Untere Havel-Wasserstraße (UHW), for which the Waterways and Shipping Office Brandenburg is responsible. It saves commercial shipping about two kilometers and the passage through the inner city of Brandenburg on the partly narrow and winding river course of the Brandenburg Niederhavel with its low bridges, which were not open at all times before. Just as important for the construction of the canal was the safe discharge of the occasional flood below the barrage.

Building history

The route of the canal followed the silo ditch created in 1782, which took its course south of the Silo suburb of the same name. In August 1907, the first work on expanding the canal began. The breakthrough took place on September 30, 1910. The canal was opened to shipping on November 19, 1910 after three years of construction. It replaced the Brandenburg City Canal for commercial shipping . With the opening of the Silo Canal for traffic, the conditions for commercial shipping between the Elbe and Berlin improved significantly. The problematic narrow and no longer expandable waterways through the inner city of Brandenburg an der Havel were therefore eliminated for the approximately 36,000 barges and push convoys.

The Adam Opel AG in 1935 built on the site of today's business park "Silokanal-Ost" ( BWB Betonwerke Berlin-Brandenburg ), the truck plant Brandenburg , which after the Second World War was dismantled. From 1970 to 1973 the canal was widened with three aisles by 6.5 m to the north in order to facilitate through-going shipping at the many transshipment points. Since this expansion was already considered when the first construction was carried out, the bridges did not need to be changed. As part of the German Unity Transport Project No. 17, the silo channel was expanded again and the banks paved according to the latest standards. Since then, the water level has been 55 m and the water depth 4 m. The railway bridge east of the port at the former steel and rolling mill was also renewed. In 2008 and 2009, the railway bridge along the former Fohrder Landstrasse was replaced by a new building at UHW -km 57.976.

The 5.25 km long silo canal begins at UHW-km 56.23 at the suburban lock at the southern end of the Beetzsee and clearly divides around 800 m of the southern end of the lake as the Kleiner Beetzsee through its pier structures . It runs from east to west north of the Altstadt Brandenburg district . The north industrial area and the Görden district are located on its north bank. In the western part of the Altstadt district on the left bank of the canal, the new city harbor of the city of Brandenburg was built. Then an industrial area begins around the area of the steel and rolling mill Brandenburg with the industrial museum . The former port of the steelworks is used to handle scrap for the electric steelworks of the Riva group. In the west, the canal ends at Quenzsee at UHW-km 61.48, where there is a coupling point for pusher shipping . The canal is connected to the Havel , which flows through the Plauer See , via the Quenzsee . The opening of the silo channel was a major reason for the steel industry to settle in Brandenburg / Havel, which began in 1912.

bridges

Five bridges cross the canal, three of which are road bridges and two are railway bridges.

Sporting use

The silo channel is particularly productive for white fish such as bream and roach . Fishing championships or other fishing events take place here very often . Predator anglers prefer the channel for fishing for pikeperch , which grow here very well due to the large number of forage fish. Catches up to 80 cm are not uncommon.

literature

Uwe Herrmann: The Silo Canal - The Story of a Waterway . In: Historischer Verein Brandenburg [Havel] e. V. (Ed.): 14th Annual Report 2004 - 2005 . Brandenburg an der Havel 2005, p. 52-62 .
Otto Tschirch: History of the Chur and capital Brandenburg on the Havel. Festschrift for the city's millennium in 1928/29 . 2 volumes 1928/1929. Brandenburg on the Havel.
Manfred Lutzens, publication on the history of the Silo Canal, Brandenburger Wochenblatt, November 14, 2010. p. 2