Another Glimpse at those Enterprising Romans

So here’s the problem…you are Romans in the 1st century BC, and you have a growing community of thirsty people in Lugdunum (Lyon) your capital in Gaul. Fortunately, you have a great source of water, but it’s the Gier River on the slopes of Mont Pilat about 42 km (~26 miles) southwest of Lugdunum. And, to complicate matters, the terrain between the source and the destination is anything BUT level or even – in fact it’s full of hills, valleys and a small mountain or two. What’s an enterprising Roman engineer to do? How about building one of the longest known Roman aqueducts (85 km or ~53 miles long)?



The Gier Aqueduct includes 73 km of covered ditches laid with a concrete culvert 3m high and 1.5m wide, which is sunk as deep as 4m beneath the land surface. The aqueduct also passes through 11 tunnels, one of which is 825m long. Then, of course, you will need to include manholes to provide access for cleaning and repairs every 77m or so. And, the design requires 10 stretches above ground with raised walls and arches. The design also includes four “inverted siphons” which caused the water flowing through the system to become pressurized flow reliably through hill and vale. (If you are interested in more info on this system, let us know, and we’ll send it to you. I’m afraid it would put some of our readers to sleep.) Oh, one other complication… you will need to complete the whole thing before it can be used.


The resulting aqueduct remains to subject of scholarly papers and a source of wonder to tourists like us. Here are some pictures we took during three day trips to different parts of the visible aqueduct.

This section is at Plat de l'Air just outside of the village of Chaponost.
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 

Here's David standing by a section to give you an idea of scale.
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 

Here a section of the aqueduct provides a wall for a house on Fourvière Hill in Lyon.

This section is a short bus ride away from downtown Lyon.  Not sure if you can tell or not, but this is in a residential/commercial area and includes a rather busy street that divides two large sections of arches.
 
 
 
 
 
 
 

Here's one family's solution for parking their car next to their home (which happens to be right next to a section of arches).  Note the bits of aqueduct caught in the fencing material above the car.