I've had my eye on this culvert for a while after seeing the interesting surface features around Bower's Buisness Park. A scout around with TunnelMon found that most lids were in daft places or had large lumps of concrete ontop. The infall was grilled but at the downstream end (by the canal) it was just possible to get a glimpse of the water where a sump pool could be seen through some overgrown mesh.
FB and I returned with a possible way in. After a couple of tries we dropped into the the culvert around halfway along at a junction chamber between the old and new sections.
Upstream was fibreglass and concrete box that had replaced the original tunnel sometime in the 70s, there was also a old but silted up brick branch which released allot of gas when glooped through. We headed downstream and found a rather nice 6ft pipe that had it's brickwork in quite an unusual stacked ring configuration.
There was a chamber at pretty much every change in direction, some with fancy brickwork and most with a flight of stairs. The tops of these chambers started as concrete (as the chambers were buried) but soon changed to timbers which reminded me of railway sleepers. Sheeting had started to be installed just below the timbers in many of the chambers and stacks of sheets were piled up at various points.
The final chamber was the only one that was still all wood and devoid of sheeting.
The pipe shrinks on the approach to the railway lines, stooping through this was unpleasant to begin with as muck from the small CSO upstream was kicked up. A shaft soon gave a chance to standup and admire the brickwork stepping upto a metal vent pipe.
Continuing downstream was a couple of smaller access chambers and finally a further shrinking as the brook passed below the railway line.
It would have been nice to see the large concrete box and sump beyond but going under the railways would have been grim. There's a little more here.
FB and I returned with a possible way in. After a couple of tries we dropped into the the culvert around halfway along at a junction chamber between the old and new sections.
Upstream was fibreglass and concrete box that had replaced the original tunnel sometime in the 70s, there was also a old but silted up brick branch which released allot of gas when glooped through. We headed downstream and found a rather nice 6ft pipe that had it's brickwork in quite an unusual stacked ring configuration.
There was a chamber at pretty much every change in direction, some with fancy brickwork and most with a flight of stairs. The tops of these chambers started as concrete (as the chambers were buried) but soon changed to timbers which reminded me of railway sleepers. Sheeting had started to be installed just below the timbers in many of the chambers and stacks of sheets were piled up at various points.
The final chamber was the only one that was still all wood and devoid of sheeting.
The pipe shrinks on the approach to the railway lines, stooping through this was unpleasant to begin with as muck from the small CSO upstream was kicked up. A shaft soon gave a chance to standup and admire the brickwork stepping upto a metal vent pipe.
Continuing downstream was a couple of smaller access chambers and finally a further shrinking as the brook passed below the railway line.
It would have been nice to see the large concrete box and sump beyond but going under the railways would have been grim. There's a little more here.
