Vantaanjokisuun vesi- ja viemärilaitokset (Vatten- och avloppsanläggningar vid Vanda ås mynning)

English translation (from the Finnish)

The text above is the record as published by the Finnish Heritage Agency (Museovirasto), in Finnish. The English below is a machine translation made by TreeAlive, not by the Finnish Heritage Agency (Museovirasto); it has not been checked by a person. Where the two differ, the original is the record. Report a translation error: privacy@treealive.com

Description

The building stock of the Vanhankaupunki and Koskela water and sewerage works illustrates the development of the capital's municipal engineering from its early stages in the 19th century to the present day. In Vanhankaupunki, production plants using water power and water have operated on the banks of the Vantaanjoki since as early as the 1550s.

The oldest red-brick buildings of the Helsingin vesilaitos are grouped at the mouth of the Vantaanjoki. On Kuninkaankartanonsaari there are rectangular filter basins built in 1895, whose present appearance, after several alterations, is apparently designed by Gunnar Taucher. At the southern tip is a circular filtration and sedimentation basin building, covered in 1914 and designed by John Lilja. The third large plant building on Kuninkaankartanonsaari is the rapid filtration plant completed in 1909 and designed by Hj. Åberg. A small balancing shaft connected to it was designed by Gunnar Taucher. On the edge of the rapids there are also a wooden water laboratory building designed by Karl Af Segerstad in 1909 and a brick water intake built in 1910. The buildings are used by the Tekniikan museo.

On the western side of the rapids, on the Vanhankaupunki shore, are a red-brick mill completed in 1884, the steam pumping station of the waterworks completed in 1931 and apparently designed by Gunnar Taucher, and the first turbine pumping station, completed in 1876. All the buildings are used by the Voimalamuseo.

The Koskela plant, which replaced the waterworks' old buildings at the river mouth, has been built since the 1920s. The oldest part of the sedimentation plant, dating from 1928, was designed by Gunnar Taucher. The sedimentation basins were extended in 1939 to plans by John Lilja and in 1963 to plans by Bertel Saarnio. The filtration plant with its basins and pumping station dates from the 1960s and 1970s.

The three residential buildings of the waterworks' supervisors and workers stand along Hämeentie, opposite the Voimalamuseo, together with their yards: the brick building of the chief machinist and machine operator from 1899, and the wooden buildings taken into use as waterworks housing about ten years later.

History

Kustaa Vaasa founded a royal manor at the mouth of the Helsinginjoki, now the Vantaanjoki, in 1550. The manor, located on an island by the rapids, operated for about twenty years. The power of the rapids had driven a mill from the 1550s onwards, almost without interruption until 1915. Industry has long existed around the rapids, among others a sawmill from 1735 to 1840, a dye works and distillery at the end of the 18th century, and later a brewery and a brick factory.

In the 1860s the City of Helsinki planned to use the water resources of the Vantaanjoki for a water supply works. Construction began in 1872 by an Austrian company under the engineer Robert Huber, and in 1875 the waterworks passed into the ownership of the City of Helsinki. First, by 1877, the filter basin on Kuninkaankartanonsaari, a stone dam and the turbine pumping station on the western bank of the rapids were completed; the iron bridge was completed in 1889. From 1876 onwards, the filtered water of the Vantaanjoki was pumped to the Alppila water tower by water turbine pumps powered by the rapids. From Alppila the water was led on into the city.

On the western bank of the river, a new brick mill powered by water was built in 1884 south of the turbine pumping station, and a steam pumping house was built to the north in 1890, which was replaced by a new steam power plant in 1931. The turbine pumping station with its pumps, the steam power plant and the mill have operated as the Voimalamuseo of the Helsingin kaupunginmuseo since 2000.

The buildings of the waterworks on Kuninkaankartanonsaari were extended until the 1950s. Operations began to be moved from the island to Koskela, north of the Vantaankoski, where, among other things, a new sedimentation plant was built in 1928-30. At the turn of the 1970s, the filtration plant, pumping station and clear water basins, among other things, were moved to Koskela, and an ozonation plant was built there in 1978. Water filtration on Kuninkaankartanonsaari ended in 1970 and all water treatment in 1972. The Tekniikan museon säätiö was founded in 1969, and the exhibition activity of the Tekniikan museo began in the former premises of the waterworks in 1972.