A hike along the renatured Emscher

DTold a friend from the Ruhr area that I wanted to hike along the Emscher. “Watt, anne Köttelbecke?!” was the mocking reaction. Although running along rivers has long been considered a premium pilgrimage elsewhere, whether on the Moselle, the Middle Rhine or the Lahn, all popular areas, and even on the Ruhr, where such a path is signposted, the Emscher seems to be absolutely exempt from this rating.

Ilias Abawi first saw her as a child. From Essen the family drove north towards Bottrop. They drove over two bridges, first over a wide body of water in which barges made powerful waves, then directly behind it over a dead-straight watercourse, a measly few meters wide, the embankments completely concreted. The water had an oily, dark sheen – and it stank to the point of sickness. His brother explained the world of water to young Ilias: “That where the ships swim and what looks like a river is actually a canal. And the narrow water here – it’s a real river.”

The deadliest river in Europe

The Schwatte, as it is also called on the left and right of the banks, because of the impenetrable surface. Or just Köttelbecke. Becke is Lower Rhine for Bach, and the Koettel – well, they just float on the water if you flush them straight from the toilet into the Emscher. Not appetizing, but harmless compared to what else accumulated in the Emscher. Lead, cadmium, zinc, mercury, coal dust, plus the whole arsenal of chemical compounds. Everything that the collieries, coking plants, smelting works and other industrial companies used to have as waste was fed into the Emscher. Its eighty-three kilometers were considered the deadliest river in Europe. Although the superlative was nonsense, the linguistic exaggeration somehow reflected reality in the north of the Ruhr area. The Emscher was the dingy corner of the pot.

And no one thought of walking along that river. Until Michael Holzach did it in 1980. In his report “Germany for free” he dedicated himself to the length of the river – and wrote: “In the district of Barop it suddenly smells like rotten eggs, in Dorstfeld caustic clouds lie over the water surface, in Holthausen a heavy sweetness spreads. No river in the world is so varied in its abomination.” It was therefore not an easy job that Ilias Abawi accepted. He is the communicator of the Köttelbecke – press spokesman for the Emschergenossenschaft, which has owned the river for a hundred and twenty-two years, so to speak. And the Emscher has turned into a gigantic above-ground sewage system – the largest open in the world.

The Köttelbecke is finally history

There are nicer tasks for a press spokesman than just marketing. But since this year he has been able to proudly present himself to the public: a mammoth project lasting thirty years and costing five and a half billion euros has made the Emscher completely free of wastewater. “The Köttelbecke is finally history!” triumphant blue steles on the river. They signal the Emscher-Weg, a hundred and one kilometer route from the source to the mouth. The Emschergenossenschaft designed it: “The quality of life and the quality of stay have been significantly improved. It is important to experience and experience that.”