Vienna water supply
_-_Wasserturm.JPG)
The Viennese water supply is controlled by two high source lines (also known as Mountain Spring Water Company) guarantees and different groundwater donors who are involved in exceptional cases in the pipeline system. In total, up to 589,000 m³ of drinking water can be fed into the Austrian capital every day .
The average daily consumption is 367,917 m³ drinking water, which corresponds to around 221 liters per inhabitant (as of 2010). The highest daily consumption in 2010 was 506,980 m³, the lowest 298,850 m³. The pipe network in the city is around 3,023 km long (2010) and supplies around 100,000 houses in Vienna. The operator of the entire water supply is the municipal department 31 (Wiener Wasserwerke) of the municipality of Vienna , which is responsible for operation and maintenance. Used water is discharged through the Viennese sewer system .
history
Already in Roman times a water pipe several kilometers long supplied the Roman military camp of Vindobona . The water was drawn from the area of today's Perchtoldsdorf and Gumpoldskirchen on the thermal bath line . There were already around 5,000 m³ daily. After the end of Roman rule, the underground pipeline system fell into disrepair, and from the Middle Ages until the beginning of the 16th century, water requirements were again met by domestic wells. Due to the loamy subsoil and the hygienic conditions at the time, the quality of the well water steadily deteriorated.
Only after the great fire in 1525 was thought about building a water distribution system again , primarily to increase the extinguishing water capacities. 1562 received imperial court finally be the first its own water supply through the Seven Hofwasserleitung , commissioned King Ferdinand I was built. The water was collected in seven wells in Oberreinprechtsdorf (part of the Margareten district ) and conducted in cast iron pipes to a reservoir under the Augustinian Bastion in Vienna, from where it was in turn forwarded to the Hofburg .
From 1565 onwards, the Hernals water pipeline finally also supplied fresh water for the population. Of the original 1,500 m³ per day, only 45 m³ later remained. The water was now sold from public wells by so-called watermen and water women . Emperor Charles VI. however, the water was Kaiserbrunn of water horsemen in vats bring. From the spring that the emperor discovered during a hunt, these transports took two and a half days each.
In the 17th century, the fountain on Neuer Markt , which was fed by a spring pipe, supplied the first parts of the city with fresh water by means of several smaller water pipes. This remained the only water supply system within Vienna until well into the 19th century. So-called waterers - they sold water from tanks on their horse-drawn wagons with which they drove through the city - and house wells continued to supply most of the population with water. In 1804, the suburbs of that time were also supplied with water for the first time thanks to the Albertine aqueduct from Hütteldorf , which was built under Albert von Sachsen-Teschen . Since the growth of the city also increased the pollution, it came in 1830 for the first time to a cholera - epidemic in Vienna, at which up to December 1831 around 2,000 people died.
Finally, between 1835 and 1841, the first comprehensive water supply system in Vienna was built: the Kaiser-Ferdinands-Wasserleitung , which brought 20,000 m³ of filtered water from the Danube into the city every day . The growth of the city soon overwhelmed this system - only around four to five liters per day were possible for each resident. Since the water was taken from the nearby Danube Canal , the water was not much purer than that from the house wells. Many cases of typhus and cholera required action.
When in 1861 seven times the amount of what the Kaiser-Ferdinands-Wasserleitung supplied was required, a public tender was issued in the Wiener Zeitung for a new water supply system. It won the project of the Viennese geologist and local councilor Eduard Suess and his colleague Carl Junker , which included a 120 km long pipeline, water storage, and a distribution system. The Vienna City Council approved the project on July 12, 1864.
Construction work began in 1870. Only three years later, the first Viennese high spring water pipeline leading from the Lower Austrian Rax - Schneeberg area along the thermal line to Vienna was completed and opened by Emperor Franz Joseph I as Europe's largest water pipeline on October 24, 1873 on the occasion of the World Exhibition . To commemorate this building, the high-jet fountain was built on Schwarzenbergplatz in Vienna . At the same time, the elevated tanks on the Rosenhügel , on the Schmelz , on the Wienerberg and on the Laaerberg were built.
As early as 1888, 90% of the residential buildings in what was then Vienna were connected to the network, which meant that the majority of the approximately 900,000 inhabitants could be supplied with clean drinking water. There was a faucet with an enamel basin on each floor - the Bassena , which can still be found in many houses of that time .
On November 6, 1896, the Breitensee pumping station at Hütteldorfer Strasse 142, the first pumping station in Vienna, went into operation.
After a long legal battle, the Wienerwaldsee was built in Untertullnerbach between 1895 and 1898 by the Belgian Compagnie des Eaux de Vienne, Societé anonyme . The water treated in the Wiental waterworks was sold as usable water to the City of Vienna, which then sold it on to various customers. In 1958, the city of Vienna acquired the waterworks and, after appropriate modifications, used it as a drinking waterworks until 2004. Today the Wiental reservoir serves as a retention basin - i.e. a rain retention basin.
Due to the rapid urban development, the water supplied by the first high spring pipeline was soon no longer sufficient. For this reason, the second Viennese spring water pipeline was built under Mayor Karl Lueger at the beginning of the 20th century . This is fed by springs in the Hochschwab area and was also opened by Emperor Franz Joseph in 1910.
The deep wells have existed in Lobau since 1966 , and are used in special cases or when water consumption is exceptionally high. The water is bank filtrate of the Danube, which is a little harder than spring water due to the long flow time in the subsoil .
In the 1970s , groundwater lakes were developed in the eastern Vienna Basin , the Mitterndorfer Senke . Because of the groundwater pollution, including from the former Fischer landfill , this water has to be treated. The many tests and procedures lasted until 2004, so they have only been delivering water since 2006.
General
capacity
The individual systems can deliver the following maximum quantities daily:
- I. High spring pipeline: 220,000 m³
- II. High spring pipeline: 217,000 m³
- Lobau groundwater works : 80,000 m³
- Moosbrunn waterworks: 62,000 m³
- Various smaller water dispensers: 10,000 m³
This results in a total of 589,000 m³. The average daily consumption of around 375,000 m³ is served by the two high spring lines (I. 173,000 m³, II. 202,000 m³). In the case of exceptionally high water consumption and in special cases, such as maintenance work or the so-called turning away , the deep wells in the Lobau , the Moosbrunn waterworks or other even smaller wells are used.
Overview map
First mountain spring line
Main article: I. Vienna high spring water pipeline
The sources of mostly with brickwork built Emperor Franz Josef's water line as the first spring water pipeline was originally called, will be Kaiserbrunn in Schwarzatal between the up to 2007 m high plateau of the Rax and the Schneeberg , the 2,076 meters the highest mountain of Lower Austria . Over the years, other springs, such as those in Gußwerk or at the foot of the Schneealpe , were fed into the first high spring pipeline . The course leads from Kaiserbrunn via Hirschwang through the Höllental by means of 3 km long tunnels, through a masonry canal via Payerbach , Neunkirchen , Bad Vöslau , Baden , Mödling to the water reservoirs such as the elevated reservoir on the Rosenhügel in the 13th district of Vienna , from where it is then redistributed.
The water flows for 16 hours before it arrives in Vienna. The difference in altitude is 276 m. It heats up to 1,5 - 2 ° C . Since the water flows freely over the entire route, no pumping stations are necessary. In the years 1953-1959 was in Neusiedl am Steinfeld the water tank Neusiedl am Steinfeld built with a capacity of 600,000 cubic meters, which is one of the largest water reservoir of Europe. The Schneealpenstollen , built between 1965 and 1968, also enables the feeding of spring water from Styria.
The pipe network for the first high spring pipeline was built by Elsner & Stumpf , who fitted many buildings with water pipes.
The water pipeline hiking trail was set up along the first high spring pipeline , which leads from Kaiserbrunn to Gloggnitz and Bad Vöslau to Mödling.
The spring areas on Rax and Schneeberg largely belong to the municipality of Vienna, are managed by the forest administration of the City of Vienna and are now almost entirely designated as water protection , spring protection and landscape protection areas.
Second mountain spring line
The second high spring line is fed by springs in the Hochschwab area. It was opened in 1910, also by Emperor Franz Joseph. It also has a sufficient gradient to Vienna so that no pumps are required. As with the first high spring pipeline, there are already large differences in altitude in the source area. This pressure is reduced in turbines as a pressure brake that supply the area from Wildalpen to Mariazell with electricity. One of the most famous of these power plants is the Gaming water pipeline power plant . The 200 km long pipeline, which mostly consists of tunnels built with stones, leads over 100 aqueducts and 19 culverts that were built from cast iron pipes , as they have to withstand up to 9 bar in places. The water takes about 36 hours to travel from the spring area to Vienna. When it comes to the supply line to the Lainz elevated tank , the pressure of the supply is so high that a turbine has also been installed there, which is now to be reactivated to generate energy. Drainage sluices are installed in the area of larger rivers, which allow the pipeline to be emptied for maintenance and cleaning work, the so-called turning away .
The largest of the springs is the Kläffer spring at the foot of the Hochschwab in the Styrian Salzatal , which has a discharge of 10,000 l / s when the snow melts (approx. 860,000 m³ or 860 million liters per day) and is one of the largest drinking water sources in Europe. However, the pipeline only has a daily capacity of 210,000 m³ with an average cross-section of 1.16 to 1.92 m in width and 1.58 to 2.08 m in height.
The line leads from Wildalpen, Lunz am See , Scheibbs , Wilhelmsburg and Neulengbach via Preßbaum to Vienna.
Most of the spring area belongs to the municipality of Vienna, which bought it from Admont Abbey .
Third aqueduct
The III. Vienna water pipeline connects the Moosbrunn waterworks in the Mitterndorfer Senke approximately 30 km south of Vienna. It donates around 64,000 cubic meters a day, which is a good quarter of the feed of the two high spring lines. The plant has been in operation since 2006.
Elevated tank
About thirty elevated tanks supply the city, which is divided into different pressure zones, with drinking water. 95% of households are supplied due to gravitational energy - i.e. without a pump. Only a few pressure zones have to be supplied with pumps, such as the Alt-Erlaa residential complex or the Millennium Tower , which have in-house pumps.
Striking elevated tanks are the now disused water tower Favoriten on Wienerberg or the Bisamberg water tank, the facade of which was designed by the sculptor Gottfried Kumpf. The daily peaks can be covered by the many containers.
Water quality
Due to the location of the springs in the pure karst area , the flow rate through the ground is usually very high. Since the water flows through the limestone from the source after 8 to 10 hours, the cleaning effect is not very strong. The headwaters in the foothills of the Alps were declared as a water protection area as early as 1965 with a size of 600 km² , which means that the water from the two high spring water pipes is so clean that it does not have to be treated even today, despite the changed environmental conditions.
The Wiener Wasserwerke work closely with the forest administration of the City of Vienna in order to carry out targeted reforestation to increase the formation of humus , which is able to store and purify the water. In addition, the City of Vienna has also participated in the professional water disposal of the shelters in the area . Due to the short stay of the water in the ground, it is rather soft with 7–9 German degrees of hardness (dH). Water from the Lobau waterworks has a total hardness of around 18 dH. The water hardness of the tap water fluctuates in all districts between 6 and 11 (in some up to 14 dH).
Water price
The water price in 2019 was 1.92 euros per cubic meter, the fee for the water meter 25.75 euros to 308.89 euros per calendar year, depending on the connection size.
Museums
Two museums have been set up in Kaiserbrunn and in Wildalpen that deal specifically with the construction and operation of the aqueduct:
- Water pipe museum Kaiserbrunn in Reichenau an der Rax
- Wildalpen water pipe museum in the Styrian Salzatal
The water tower on Wienerberg is regularly used for exhibitions that have nothing to do with water; to the west of it is the water tower water playground , where the water festival is held in June .
Additional tasks for the city of Vienna
When the water consensus was granted for the two high spring water pipes, the City of Vienna was obliged, among other things, to supply drinking water to Naßwald and Matzendorf, but also to maintain roads and bridges in the forest areas. In the province of Lower Austria, the State of Vienna looks after 32 bridges in the Nasswald, Hirschwang and Stixenstein area and 21 bridges in the Wildalpen area in the State of Styria. In 2011, for example, the Rechenbrücke and the Schneiderbrücke were rebuilt by the City of Vienna.
International Working Group of Waterworks in the Danube Basin (IAWD)
The international working group of waterworks in the Danube catchment area , founded in 1993 , is based at the Vienna Waterworks in the Grabnergasse office building on Grabnergasse in Vienna- Mariahilf .
See also
literature
- A. Drennig: The first Viennese spring water pipeline. Festschrift published by the Vienna City Administration, Section 31 - Waterworks, on the occasion of the 100th anniversary on October 24, 1973 . Jugend und Volk, Vienna 1973, ISBN 3-7141-6829-X .
- A. Drennig: The second Viennese spring water pipeline. Festschrift published by the Vienna City Administration, Section 31 - Waterworks . Compress-Verlag, Vienna 1988, ISBN 3-900607-11-7 .
Web links
- Municipal Department 31 - Vienna Waterworks
- History of the Viennese water supply
- Museum HochQuellenWasser Wildalpen
- The two Viennese high spring water pipes - what else they will bring ( Memento from December 18, 2010 in the Internet Archive )
- Interview with Hans Sailer, director of the Vienna waterworks
- Vienna waterworks
- Wiener Wasser Documentation by Georg Riha, Manfred Christ and Harald Pokieser, ORF 2010, 3sat
Individual evidence
- ^ Moosbrunn waterworks . Retrieved June 27, 2015.
- ↑ Water purchase and water meter fee - notification. City of Vienna, accessed on May 10, 2020 (see subsection “Costs and Payment”).
- ↑ New construction of the Rechenbrücke and the Schneider Bridge. Bridge construction and foundation engineering in Vienna (Municipal Department 29), accessed on May 21, 2014 .