Maschsee

Maschsee
Maschsee seen from the new city hall
Location	Hanover, Lower Saxony
Coordinates	52°21′16″N 9°44′35″E / 52.35444°N 9.74306°E / 52.35444; 9.74306Coordinates: 52°21′16″N 9°44′35″E / 52.35444°N 9.74306°E / 52.35444; 9.74306
Type	artificial lake
Basin countries	Germany
Max. length	ca. 2.4 km (1.5 mi)
Max. width	530 m (1,740 ft)
Surface area	0.78 km2 (0.30 sq mi)
Average depth	ca. 2 m (6 ft 7 in)
Water volume	160,000 m3 (130 acre·ft)
Surface elevation	53.20 m (174.5 ft)
Settlements	Hanover

The Maschsee is an artificial lake situated south of the city centre of Hanover in Germany. Spanning an area of 78 hectares, it is the largest body of water within the capital of Lower Saxony. The lake is a popular recreation area as well as a venue for numerous water sports.

The name of the lake stems from the so-called “Leinemasch“, or simply ”Masch“, meaning swamp. This is the historical description for the area in which the lake was built, that was in a deep-lying floodplain of the River Leine.

It was first considered to create a lake in the wide river valley of the River Leine near Hanover during the late 19th century. This tied in with the by-then necessary dyking of the River Leine and the River Ihme, which would regularly flood the city after snow melted in the Harz Mountains in spring. The creation of a lake could reduce the threat of high water levels and put the Leine’s river valley area to better use.

In the course of the decades there were further, very different designs: Small solutions and larger ones, which envisaged the Schützenplatz (shooting range) as an island in the lake. In September 1925 the newly elected city mayor Arthur Menge commissioned Otto Franzius, a water engineer and professor at the Hanover Technical College (now University of Hanover), to work out the details of the construction of a lake together with the city’s building authorities. Franzius was to be responsible for the designing of the hydro-engineering and hydrological elements of the project, while the city authorities, led by Karl Elkart, would handle the urban development aspects.

In contrast to the original idea that the lake be dug down into swamp land and then be supplied with water by the Leine, a new proposal emerged to build the Maschsee atop the swamp in a bowl-like structure – raising it higher than the water level of the Leine – and having it be filled using a system of water pumps. This would eradicate the problem of a potential accumulation of mud through flood waters.

Franzius created a final design that proved both effective and financially acceptable, whereupon the city authorities provided a grant of 14,000 Reichsmarks in January 1926 toward attempts to seal the basin of the proposed lake.