Severočeské muzeum will present waterworks of Liberec and Jablonec

Liberec - The waterworks of Liberec and Jablonec will be presented in an exhibition at the North Bohemian Museum in Liberec in September. In addition to basic information about the dams, which have been mentioned many times in literature and exhibitions, construction diaries, original drawings, and original photographs from the construction of the dams will also be displayed, said museum spokesperson Tomáš Trávníček to ČTK today.
The museum will mainly showcase the unique system of retention reservoirs built in the foothills of the Jizera Mountains between 1902 and 1911. Five dams: in Liberec on the Harcovský stream, in Bedřichov on the Černá Nisa, in Fojtka on the Fojtský stream, in Mlýnice on the Albrechtický stream, and in Jablonec on the Mšenský stream, were constructed according to the project of German engineer Otto Intze. The reason for their construction was primarily to protect against floods, which regularly affected the area at the end of the 19th century. According to the director of the Elbe River Basin in Jablonec, Jaroslav Jaroušek, another dam was planned on the Jeřice, but construction did not take place for financial reasons.
The five dams made of quarry stone, the smallest of which is the five-hectare Mlýnice and the largest dam Bedřichov with a flooded area of over 40 hectares, were the first water management system not only in Austria-Hungary but in all of Europe. Today, the dams serve not only as protection against floods but also as recreational water areas for fishing, and they include hydroelectric power plants. Other structures such as underground conduits to the Mšenská dam and the Rudolfov hydropower plant will also be shown in the exhibition, according to Trávníček.
However, the exhibition, according to Trávníček, does not focus solely on the well-known large waterworks. “Another part of the exhibition will be dedicated to watercourses – Lužická, Bílá and Černá Nisa, Kamenice and others, where descriptions of weirs, inflows, and turbines for factories and workshops, primarily in the textile and glass industry, will be provided,” added Trávníček. According to him, the exhibition will be open to the public until mid-October.