Water level in Grand Canal Harbour (Grand Canal Square)

OmegaRed

Has anyone noticed the water level has dropped by about 2 feet in the main basin of the Grand Canal Harbour/Dock? The smell yesterday when people were drinking outside Ocean bar mush have been pretty bad with the sun and the pollution around there.

I presume the lock gates were opened on the Liffy to reduce the water level. Anyone know why?

Tails142

OmegaRed wrote: »

Has anyone noticed the water level has dropped by about 2 feet in the main basin of the Grand Canal Harbour/Dock? The smell yesterday when people were drinking outside Ocean bar mush have been pretty bad with the sun and the pollution around there.

I presume the lock gates were opened on the Liffy to reduce the water level. Anyone know why?

Maintenance works on the canal in inchicore reduced the flow of water into dublin, water was diverted to the river cammock and the grand canal basin was slowly dropping over the past few weeks, the maintenance works were finished last week so the level should start rising slowly in the dock. Leaks on the old gates into the liffey didn't help things either.

Tabnabs

Surely the water levels in the the Basin can be restored by just opening the sea-locks and letting water in that way?

Tails142

Tabnabs wrote: »

Surely the water levels in the the Basin can be restored by just opening the sea-locks and letting water in that way?

The normal basin water level is higher than the max tidal level unfortunately, plus the basin is fresh water so if the water coming in was any way briney it might cause issues for the fish that are in there.

It doesn't cause any major issues if the water level drops anyway as it's mostly over 4 metres deep except around the edges where rubbish has been thrown in. I think the only problem is for the shops on the naomh eanna as their entrance doors are at a fixed height so when the whole ship drops you have to duck to get in

Ste.phen

Does anyone know if the sudden drop in water level of grand canal dock is deliberate or is one of the locks bursting?
The entire dock has lowered in level by about 70cm or so over the last few days; it's really obvious if you look at the edges, and some sunken boats are popping their heads up, etc

Took this pic of where the water's going out the biggest (broken) lock but it wasn't clear whether it was that they'd opened the sluice, or if it was bursting

Just curious, both in general and because it's going to start smelling AWFUL beside my office if the water level gets too close to ground

Pigeon Reaper

The sluice is open in the picture. A few boats are heading into the basin from the Liffey later today so they may have cleaned out the sea lock in preparation.

Ste.phen

The large lock doesn't work as far as I know, only the middle one with the mechanical opening mechanism works - the corresponding gate from the one i photographed appears to be pretty badly damaged

Degsy

Tails142 wrote: »

The normal basin water level is higher than the max tidal level unfortunately, plus the basin is fresh water so if the water coming in was any way briney it might cause issues for the fish that are in there.

What kind of fish live there? Is the population in any way healthy or numerous?

Ste.phen

Couldn't tell you about variety or quantity, but there's certainly plenty of fish in there and they're reasonably large (to a complete layman such as myself, anyway)
If you're in that area you can often see the fish quite easily by looking down from the bridge at the end of Pearse St

Tails142

Roach, perch, tench, pike.. that kind of thing.