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The Conquest of Nature
I had not realized how man-made and engineered the Rhine was, and how early this occurred:
This was the largest civil engineering project that had ever been undertaken in Germany. The Rhine between Basel and Worms was shortened from 220 to 170 miles, almost a quarter of its length. Dozens of cuts were made, more than twenty-two hundred islands removed. Along the stretch between Basel and Strasbourg alone, well over a billion square yards of island or peninsula were excavated and 160 miles of main dikes constructed containing 6.5 million cubic yards of material. During the 1860s the number of fascines being used was running at up to 800,000 a year.
That is from David Blackburn's The Conquest of Nature: Water, Landscape, and the Making of Modern Germany. This history of water engineering is not a book for all of you, but if you think you might like it, you will.
Addendum: Elsewhere on the new book front, Niall Ferguson is a splendid author, but his new The War of the World doesn't add much.
Posted by Tyler Cowen on September 23, 2006 at 06:59 AM in Books, History | Permalink
Comments
It was also a prime example, how hard it is to transform nature, or rather to predict nature. I'm living only a few miles from the new and the old Rhein. When Tulla started to re-engineer the flow of the Rhein, he never anticipated the effects it could have (from preventing floodings up to using the power of water).
Sadly, a part of the straightening of the Rhein had to be forced with military violence, since the fishmern lost most of their income due to the stronger flow of the river and the loss of the meandering quality.
Another unforseen consequence was the split between the old Rhein in the north and the south. While the south was readily equipped for the stronger flow of the rhine, the north was not (even today we have floodings due to this divergence in the north). Also, the Rhein lowered the groundwater and thus caused velds.
Posted by: Max at Sep 23, 2006 8:26:34 AM
I don't know about "preventing floodings". Look at the huge floods at various places along the Elbe in the last few years, a lot of them probably caused or at least exacerbated by how canalised rivers in heavily populated areas mostly are these days - no water meadows, gravel banks, bends etc. to soak up high water and eat up its momentum.
In Munich, where I live, there is a big project underway to "re-naturalise" the Isar - taking away the canal banks, encouraging the re-growth of meadows & beaches and so on. Partly on aesthetic & conservation grounds, but partly also for ... flood prevention.
Posted by: Alan Little at Sep 23, 2006 10:56:52 AM
http://sciam.com/article.cfm?chanID=sa006&colID=1&articleID=000C34A3-A3E7-150E-A26183414B7F0000
Posted by: Bill Cristal at Sep 23, 2006 12:47:27 PM
One of the most significant jobs of water engineering in US history, the Mississippi at St Louis, was already completed by the 1860s. By that time the officer who oversaw the job, still honored by the US Army Corps of Engineers, was commanding the Army of Virginia in opposition to the US Army. I'm referring to Robert E Lee.
Posted by: triticale at Sep 24, 2006 9:28:04 AM
Well, I think one of the biggest improvements of the Rhine re-engineering was the decrease of malaria, which improved health issues. If you visit the old side-arms of the Rhine nowadays, you may want to take a mosquito spray with you.
There are also other ways of preventing flooding, due to natural means:
Higher Dams around the river, giving it a more meandering form before it flows in the cities.
A complete re-naturalization is not admirable, imo, but to decrease the strength of the normal flow is a good measure to prevent excessive flooding. You can also split streams to lower their force, but you have to be carefull at those splitting intersections (turbular streams etc.).
Posted by: Max at Sep 24, 2006 11:23:41 AM
I presume you have read John McPhee's Control of Nature? A third of the book discusses the Army Corps of Engineers' efforts to keep the Mississippi in its bed. Amazing stuff.
Posted by: Megan at Sep 24, 2006 11:46:34 PM
Think of the horse and human power that this effort took (and the one on the Mississippi as well). The toll on human and horse flesh must have been quite high. No or very few steam powered machines. Almost all the power to dig and move the material was mammaliam muscle. Incredible. All that just to make things worse.
Posted by: Murphy at Sep 26, 2006 11:14:36 AM
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