Dam Flask - low water levels

[Pyrotequila 402]

13 minutes ago, Padders said:

Many years ago you could see the church steeple appear when the water was low, this drew crowds of people to the area, and caused congestion on the roads, so the authorities decided to blow the steeple up.. and you call these people scum.

I was under the impression they did that because people used to try and swim out to the ruins? So they tried to stop people drowning.

 

 

 

[Cyclone 10]

I noticed some quite old graffiti when I walked around it, names scratched from 1983 or maybe 85, according to the dates.  So it seems to be somewhat of a tradition to mark the years it's accessible.

[Treeman893 10]

From information I have recently acquired there is no water supply to Sheffield via the Rivelin Tunnel. Although infrastructure exists this route would require water to pumped to a  level approximately 70 feet above the normal levels to send it through the Rivelin Tunnel. I have spoken recently to an engineer at Severn Trent who advised me that the valve at the Ladybower end of the Rivelin tunnel is closed and has been for a while. I have photos of water exiting the tunnel but this is just water from the moors leaking into it.

 

[jaffa1 10]

9 hours ago, Pyrotequila said:

I was under the impression they did that because people used to try and swim out to the ruins? So they tried to stop people drowning.

 

 

 

You're  right, some use to get into difficulties trying to swim out to the church steeple and the water authorities  get a bit fed up with having to go to their rescue.

[katekate 15]

Went out to Ladybower yesterday to have a look at the ruins.  Very muddy and busy but well worth a look if you like that kind of thing.  My mum used to tell me about the village under the water, she passed away 30 years ago!  Great to see the remains but a shame about the vandalism  that has been reported.  

[Pyrotequila 402]

Went up to Ladybower today, and oddly Howden and Derwent reservoirs look much fuller than Ladybower.

So much so that it made me think that perhaps they are artificially keeping it lower by not filtering water down in order to keep the ruins exposed to attract more visitors.

 

Maybe I'm being cynical.

[FORE 12]

2 hours ago, Pyrotequila said:

Went up to Ladybower today, and oddly Howden and Derwent reservoirs look much fuller than Ladybower.

So much so that it made me think that perhaps they are artificially keeping it lower by not filtering water down in order to keep the ruins exposed to attract more visitors.

 

Maybe I'm being cynical.

Strangely Howden was far worse than Ladybower in the early summer. I was thinking then it ought to be as you describe.

 

Went up Kinder on Tuesday and the streams / brooks were far more substantial than recent.

 

Fairbrook was some challenge getting across to use the path to Seal edge.

[hilldweller 10]

On 11/25/2018 at 8:44 PM, Treeman893 said:

From information I have recently acquired there is no water supply to Sheffield via the Rivelin Tunnel. Although infrastructure exists this route would require water to pumped to a  level approximately 70 feet above the normal levels to send it through the Rivelin Tunnel. I have spoken recently to an engineer at Severn Trent who advised me that the valve at the Ladybower end of the Rivelin tunnel is closed and has been for a while. I have photos of water exiting the tunnel but this is just water from the moors leaking into it.

 

The supply to the Rivelin tunnel is taken from the Derwent Valley Aquaduct pipes that run from the Derwent & Howden Dams at a higher level up the hillside behind the fisheries office. There is no need to pump. Tappings off the two big pipes, ( the same ones you can see crossing the upper Ladybower Dam), feed a pair of big ball valves filling a tank in a stone building. This tank discharges  over a measuring weir into the entry portal of the Rivelin Tunnel. The ingress from above he tunnel amounts to only about 5% of the amount going in .  (10 million litres a day / 50 million gallons in old money).

The water to Rivelin was fixed by Royal Statute at the beginning of the 20th century. Part of the gathering grounds of the Howden Dam lie within the Sheffield City Boundary.

ST did try to have the flow suspended a few years ago during a severe drought, but when it was found that they intended not to use it but  to send it all the way down their system and sell it to a southern water company, Yorkshire Water told them where to go.

A few minutes ago I found a very detailed research paper written by ST looking at additional  resources. In this paper, dated 2018 they dismiss the idea of asking for a reduction in the bulk raw water supply to Rivelin as not feasible. This paper is available on the t'internet but is copyright.

During the last summer I had a look down there and although the Redmires water down the Wyming Brook was at a trickle the water issuing into the Lower Rivelin Dam from the Tunnel/Redmires mixing tank was at the normal flow rate.

Edited December 6, 2018 by hilldweller
spelling

[Annie Bynnol 612]

44 minutes ago, hilldweller said:

The supply to the Rivelin tunnel is taken from the Derwent Valley Aquaduct pipes that run from the Derwent & Howden Dams at a higher level up the hillside behind the fisheries office. There is no need to pump. Tappings off the two big pipes, ( the same ones you can see crossing the upper Ladybower Dam), feed a pair of big ball valves filling a tank in a stone building. This tank discharges  over a measuring weir into the entry portal of the Rivelin Tunnel. The ingress from above he tunnel amounts to only about 5% of the amount going in .  (10 million litres a day / 50 million gallons in old money).

The water to Rivelin was fixed by Royal Statute at the beginning of the 20th century. Part of the gathering grounds of the Howden Dam lie within the Sheffield City Boundary.

ST did try to have the flow suspended a few years ago during a severe drought, but when it was found that they intended not to use it but  to send it all the way down their system and sell it to a southern water company, Yorkshire Water told them where to go.

A few minutes ago I found a very detailed research paper written by ST looking at additional  resources. In this paper, dated 2018 they dismiss the idea of asking for a reduction in the bulk raw water supply to Rivelin as not feasible. This paper is available on the t'internet but is copyright.

During the last summer I had a look down there and although the Redmires water down the Wyming Brook was at a trickle the water issuing into the Lower Rivelin Dam from the Tunnel/Redmires mixing tank was at the normal flow rate.

Any agreement made at the beginning of the 20th century between organizations which no longer exist,  has long been superseded. Certainly by the 90's Yorkshire were paying Severn Trent over a £million for the right to extract  21%. This has changed significantly again as YW wanted out of the agreement that bound them to 21% of costs. This together with the new YW Rivelin treatment works, Redmires  refurbishments ( Wyming Brook is not a supply) and ST's new Bamford works has much changed the use (if any ) of the tunnel.

[Cyclone 10]

14 hours ago, Pyrotequila said:

Went up to Ladybower today, and oddly Howden and Derwent reservoirs look much fuller than Ladybower.

So much so that it made me think that perhaps they are artificially keeping it lower by not filtering water down in order to keep the ruins exposed to attract more visitors.

 

Maybe I'm being cynical.

Well that's confusing, because the ruins are in the Derwent not the LB.

[Annie Bynnol 612]

48 minutes ago, Cyclone said:

Well that's confusing, because the ruins are in the Derwent not the LB.

The ruins that everyone going to see and photographing are being revealed by the low-level of the Ladybower reservoir.

The main valley was formed by the Derwent river and collectively referred to as the Derwent dams.

 

[hilldweller 10]

12 hours ago, Annie Bynnol said:

Any agreement made at the beginning of the 20th century between organizations which no longer exist,  has long been superseded. Certainly by the 90's Yorkshire were paying Severn Trent over a £million for the right to extract  21%. This has changed significantly again as YW wanted out of the agreement that bound them to 21% of costs. This together with the new YW Rivelin treatment works, Redmires  refurbishments ( Wyming Brook is not a supply) and ST's new Bamford works has much changed the use (if any ) of the tunnel.

About 15/20 years ago YW took a decision to first mothball and then close the Redmires Water Treatment Works. The exception being the covered service reservoir. The former filter house and other buildings were sold in 2012 for £98,000 by Reed Raines

They stated at the time that in future the water from the three Redmires Dams would be sent down the natural watercourse,  that is the Wyming Brook. This raw water would in future be processed at the enlarged Rivelin Treatment Works, together with the Rivelin Dams and (possibly) Rivelin Tunnel raw water.

Before the closure took place a new single large bore pipeline was laid to take pumped treated water from the Rivelin Works to the Redmires service reservoir. It climbs up from Rivelin to the corner of Lodge Lane and turns right all the way up Redmires Road to the Redmires Service Reservoir. At the same time the several iron pipes under Redmires/Sandygate Roads taking the treated water into the city were broken into and plastic pipes inserted.

A pipe that turned along Blackbrook Road was re-conditioned by a inserting a  "mole" device that scrubbed the bore and sprayed a coating to protect it. This pipe runs to the tanks at Norton via the tanks at Ringinglow. All this work caused a great deal of disruption at the time.

The work that has been carried out at Redmires has included  heightening the dam walls presumably to increase capacity/ safety.

Unless YW has found a clever way of routing the water from the 3 Redmires Dams to Rivelin Treatment Works without anyone seeing them I think that you can say that the Wyming Brook at least forms part of the "supply chain".

 

P.S.  I've just found another Reed Raines sales leaflet for the land comprising the former Treatment Works,  it says "Sale Agreed" and the asking price was £277,000, I can't find a date though.

 

Edited December 7, 2018 by hilldweller
P.S. added