Lunch lecture History of rivers
Description
The credo of current river policy is: the climate is changing, there will be more water; the dykes cannot be higher; water levels must go down. Dykes are shifted, high-water channels are made, more storage must be created. But what was it like in the past?
Around 1800, all major hydraulic engineers thought Holland and Utrecht would perish due to high river levels. Only one remedy remained in their perception: spreading the water coming from above. A new approach to the river problem came in 1850. It was decided to normalise the rivers. The river was narrowed by building groynes. In addition, each river was given its own outlet to the sea. The dykes were raised and strengthened. After 1861, the number of floods was drastically reduced.
After 1953, flood standards were set for the rivers, along with input from conservationists. Together with the high discharges of 1993 and 1995, this formed the basis for Room for the River. According to Rijkswaterstaat, we will have drier summers and wetter winters. Resulting in greater river discharge extremes. But are these predictions realistic? What can we learn from the past?
Speaker(s)
Ton Burgers will talk at length about this following his book 'Dutch great rivers, Three centuries of flood fighting'.
Location
TU Delft
Organiser
Architecture and Hydraulic Engineering
The "Practical Study" Society
Name and contact details for information
Yorick Ligthart
Apply via
Registration can be done by sending an e-mail to Yorick Ligthart at:
voorzitter-ps@tudelft.nl