Construction work causes Töölönlahti water to flood street

Water from Töölönlahti, a bay in Helsinki, flooded a street and running paths this week after construction work temporarily cut the water connection to nearby Eläintarhanlahti bay, Yle reports.

By Wednesday morning, parts of the paths in Töölönlahti Park, between Finlandia Hall and the railway, were still under water. The flooding began at the southern end of the bay earlier in the week.

A flood protection project on the strip of land between the two bays began a planned week-long closure of the water connection last Wednesday. The work involved building a protective wall to prevent the water from becoming cloudy, as well as drilling the final piles for the water channel and retaining walls.

Juuso Luoto, a team manager in Helsinki’s city environment division, said the closure caused the water level in Töölönlahti to rise. He said monitoring of the bay’s water level had failed because workers did not check the situation on the southern shore.

The construction site received information about the flooding on Tuesday afternoon and responded immediately. The water channel was reopened later that day, at about 4pm, once the work had been completed far enough. The alternative would have been to bring a tanker truck with a pump to the site, Luoto said.

The flood protection project has previously drawn criticism. In October, it emerged that gravel filling and embankment work had been carried out without the required permits. About a week later, residents monitoring the area found thousands of fish trapped in the channel between the two bays.

Several neighbourhood activists and organisations have spent years trying to prevent the flood protection structures from being built. Helsingin Sanomat also previously reported on water flooding the street.