Tarting Up the Heritage

You're looking at a whole hill full of “heritage” that’ll be left for many future generations. Beneath the surface of an outlook with comfortable paths for taking a walk it’s 4,8 million cubic meters of slag, the byproduct/waste of over a hundred years of local steel production. It was technically a dump for industrial waste, from rather “benign” slag to ponds full of oil-soaked sand and dirt with all the side effects like vapors and dust being blown around by the wind, the whole area of the hill is covered first with plastic foil (visible as black layer on the right side) to keep rain from washing away any harmful substances, then a layer of earth is added (center part) and grass and shrubbery is planted to secure the earth layer (left side).

Since the steel mill closed down in 2002, the whole area has been without an owner and thus fell back to state care. The beautification project started in 2005 and is scheduled to finish in 2012. The quarterly monitoring of 25 points of measurement for the ground water quality around the area will continue for the foreseeable future. Truly a heap of heritage...

Europe / Germany

Lat: 49° 28' 29.31" N
Long: 11° 45' 38.66" E

Elevation: 429 m

→ maps.google.com [EXT]

Precision is: High. Pinpoints the exact spot.

Canon EOS 500 D, EF-S 18-55 IS @ 18mm, Manfrotto 303 SPH, PTGui 9.0, Photoshop CS5