Flood protection, River Reuss, Switzerland

After the flood disaster in 1987, we were commissioned by the government of Kanton Uri to evaluate and elaborate the necessary river construction work.

In the area of the village Erstfeld the riverbed needed a correction over a length of 3 km and the A2 motorway was adapted over a length of 2 km to serve as flood channel for the flood peak discharge.

The main problems we had to cope with:

Security concept for flooding scenarios, dam renovations, overtopping of dams, geotechnics, renaturation, hydraulics, bed load regime (MORMO simulations), flood overflow over motorway, enrichment of groundwater with bank filtrate of the river Reuss, flood guiding mechanisms along the motorway, bridges.