German Drains! 924 and Trinity

Whilst the usual urbex shizzle is as popular in Germany as it is in any other country, I have not yet heard of anyone who does drains here. In the past I therefore assumed that there just weren't any worth wile ones around, backed up by my failure of finding anything good after hours of research. That was until a few months ago when Dr Drewboy kept finding new material on the interwebs.
 

 

Fast forward to a few days ago, our plan was to check out two drains and then head 400 meter underground, all that in the Ruhrgebiet. The first destination was the outfall of a small stream that is culverted from its source. Due to the heavy industry in the region the brook is mixed with sewage at various junctions underground. 

 

I was quite surprised by the number of features along the drain, whether they were junctions, chambers or the differently build pipes. From the outfall onwards, the sewage mix flows overground for a few more kilometres, joining with other streams (also mixed with sewage) to finally flow untreated into a canal.

Once all photos were taken we headed back to the car and programmed the satnav for the second outfall. With the turning of the key the 924 suddenly made an explosion like noise and smoke appeared from underneath the bonnet. Whilst we could fix all parts back to their place, the car would not start, even after some professional help from the "Yellow Angels", so we were left to walk and had to give up on our third location.

This second drain, named by Dr Drewboy as Trinity, is the culverted part of a similarly seized stream. As before it mixes with sewage at various junctions and then flows overground, joining the stream we visited before, to then run into the canal. From the outfall we walked through a 4-5m large concrete pipe for a some time until we reached a large chamber, joining the main pipe with two bricked ones. One of these also split into two egged shaped pipes only a few metres behind. The large concrete pipe can be followed for one more junctions before it ends at a large drop of roughly 15 metres. 

 

All in all a great introduction to German drains. Hopefully more to come soon!