Hellengerst has the channel full - penalties threaten

Created: 03/29/2022, 1:00 p.m

By: Lutz Baucker

Sewage alarm: The simple, small bio-sewage treatment plant in this hut in Hellengerst no longer makes it.

A new canal down into the valley should help.

© Bauer

Weitnau – The decades-old small sewage treatment plant in the district of Hellengerst is in danger of collapsing, untreated sewage could flood the idyllic Fuchsbach.

There is an acute need for action for the market community.

In an almost three-hour marathon meeting, the municipal council decided to connect the current 224 residents and a large golf hotel to the central sewage disposal system via a 6.5-kilometer-long pipeline through the Weitnau valley.

Astonishment, helplessness and construction stop

When Berthold Abt (Technical Director of the Isny-Weitnau-WAV Water and Wastewater Association) presented the alarming figures to the assembled council and a surprisingly large number of listeners, astonishment and helplessness quickly spread.

"The sewage treatment plant in Hellengerst exceeds the permissible limit values, the necessary biological purification capacity is no longer available, we have to solve the problem immediately!" Mayor Florian Schmid has already imposed a construction freeze for Hellengerst in order not to allow the waste water volumes to increase even further.

Limit values ​​exceeded for a good two years

As Abt explained, the "simple system, which is completely sufficient for village conditions" ran without any abnormalities until autumn 2019.

But from then on, sewage foreman Ulrich Schneider and his colleagues from the WAV found inadmissible measured values ​​and sharply increasing discharges.

There was only speculation about the reasons at the municipal council meeting, and there are apparently no reliable findings at the moment.

"Reality caught up with us, this negative development was not foreseeable," said Abt. Until 2017, the small wastewater treatment plant was only 60 percent utilized, he emphasized.

It could not be verified to what extent the expansion of the local hotel "Hanusel-Hof", which is very popular with golfers from near and far, plays a role.

Schneider and Schmid speculated whether the extremely increased supply of bactericidal and virus-killing agents since the beginning of the pandemic could have put an end to the plant, which is based on biological cleaning.

Decentralized or centralized waste water disposal

Daniel Mignat from the consulting engineering office Sweco stated soberly: "Biology isn't coming back!" In other words: Hellengerst quickly needs a new solution to deal with the excretions of its residents and holiday guests.

Mignat presented two options: "Either we expand the small sewage treatment plant or we close it and lay a sewage pipe from the Hellengerster height down into the valley to Weitnau." Solution one should cost around 640,000 euros, for solution two the expert estimated 2.7 million euros .

However, Mignat predicts annual costs of around 40,000 euros for the operation of the beefed-up Hellengerst septic tank, while only around 12,000 euros would be incurred for the direct discharge.

Information that visibly moved the municipal councilors and also repeatedly led to comments from the audience.

Despite subsidies, 1.6 million remain

Weitnau's chamberlain, Thomas Klöpf, calculated the financial burden that the construction of a new, kilometer-long sewer could incur for the market town.

"The Free State is funding the project with 850,000 euros, we have already put aside almost 300,000 euros, so around 1.6 million remain from the municipal coffers."

Klöpf pointed out the need to take out a loan, but emphasized that the sewage fees for the citizens remained stable.

Clear vote for Hellengerster sewer construction

To be connected directly to the large, joint sewage treatment plant in Unterried near Isny ​​with a new line or to continue to treat the sewage on site and possibly in a few years to be faced with a similar problem as now - these alternatives led to a lively and persistent Discussion.

When the deputy mayor Evi Kaspar asked the decisive question - "Can Hellengerst still be saved?" - expert Daniel Mignat gave a clear answer: "No!"

With only one dissenting vote, the municipal council voted for the construction of the new sewer.

"We will speak to the affected property owners as soon as possible," announced Mayor Schmid, "the project must be tackled quickly, otherwise we may face fines!" He reacted with horror when he found out how long the plans might take: "One year ?!

No, that can't be true!” Schmid made it clear that he was pushing for the planning to be processed more quickly.