Nederland - Marknesse, Waterloopbos

The Waterloopbos - official address in Marknesse, but as a matter of fact located nearby the small village of Kraggenburg - was built in the early 1950s. It offers 35 scale models of major water works from all over the world. Of course the famous Dutch Delta Works were tested here, but also for instance the ports of Rotterdam, Lagos, IJmuiden, Istanbul and Bangkok. Testing and simulating reality by engineers of the Waterloopkundig Laboratoriumwas done in the 50’s and 60’s of the 20th century.

The Waterloopbos is located in the Noordoostpolder, one of the many Dutch polders. As this ‘new’ land lies five metres below sea level, so water could flow naturally to the test setups without needing pumps. With the help of this flowing water plus the creation of weirs, dams and wave machines, the engineers were able to test the influences certain forces would have on their proposed constructions.

No more testing has been done here for decades and in many places the models have been reclaimed by nature. The old water ducts, weirs and sluices are now full of plants and shrubs. Parts of the Waterloopbos look like a green jungle, where the forest interacts with the dated technology.

One of the models - a gigantic structure of two concrete walls - has been transformed into a massive artwork: Deltawerk //.