Authors: Ouchen Hicham, El Askri Ali, Essalhi Yassine, Mezghad Brahim

Lock of Viesville

Introduction 3. Desired future project

On the Charleroi-Brussels canal, the canal The project that is under consideration and
linking the two cities has a waterway of 70 km. development will be a new 12.5m wide and
Most of the current canal infrastructure was 112.5m long lock while a control building will
built in 1920. The Charleroi-Brussels Canal is be built between the 2 locks to have a control
accessible to 1350 ton boats. There are 10 locks centre. Lateral displacement gates as well as
in this canal. We are interested in the Viesville upstream and downstream embankments -
lock. This lock is located in the part southern of which will serve as garages - will be installed.
this canal. An enlargement of the turning basin is also
planned to allow the turning of larger boats. the
Why do we use a lock?
construction of a bridge to allow the passage of
The Charleroi Brussels Canal crosses 2 rivers. vehicles is also being studied. The exact
The Scheldt and the Meuse. The canal crosses position of this road bridge is still to be
the catchment areas of these two rivers. This is determined.
why we use a lock to make boats from both
rivers up and down. 4. Technical aspects
4.1. Type of gates
1. Historic
Overhead doors with lateral movement are
The history of our Charleroi-Brussels canal, on
straight one-piece structures whose movement
which our Viesville lock is located, begins in
is achieved by trolleys running on a
1830. At that time, the canal had a gauge of 70
superstructure. The door is connected to the
tons for a width of 6m with a capacity of 55
trolleys via cables, which suspend the door
locks. Over the years the measurements evolved
permanently even when the trolleys are not in
to reach a gauge size of 1350 tons with a
use.
variable width and a draught of 3m in 1950 (the
draught is the height of the immersed part of the These doors are therefore not supposed to rest
boat which varies according to the load on the ground and do not include any
transported). submerged mechanism (trolleys), which
constitutes a huge advantage in terms of the
maintenance of the structure. In order to install
this type of door, we need to provide a gantry.
A disadvantage of this type of door is the need
for a garage to house the door when it is open.
This requires additional space on the property.
2. Current situation
The door should be 0.60 m larger on both sides
The present lock, which was built in 1956, is an to accommodate the sill and seal against the
ECMT IV lock with a Johann Welker gauge. jambs, and have a clearance of 0.60 m at the
The ECMT class is a classification of bottom to accommodate the sill and seal against
waterways according to their size and capacity the threshold.
to accommodate ships. The dimensions of the
lock are 11.5 m wide and 85.9 m long, while the 4.2. Archimède screw
fall is 7.55 m.
In the past, lock sites were equipped with
pumping stations to pump water and balance the

GH4T 10 May 2021

water level for the passage of barges. The three excavation separately from the raft. If the
pumping stations at the lock sites of Viesville, ground is strong enough, the sidewalls can be
Gosselies and Marchienne-au-Pont are now built first and then the raft.
equipped with three 'Archimède screws' per
lock. They have a capacity of 2.5 m³ of water 5. Forces acting on the structure
per second, i.e. 9000 m³ per hour. These screws
require less maintenance than the pumps and
have far fewer problems with solid waste.
In addition, they consume less electricity and
are more conducive to fish movement. This
screw, which can rotate in a gyratory direction,
thus becomes a turbine producing energy
through the flow of the waterfall. This will only
be possible when the water levels in the upper
parts of the canal are too high, for example after
heavy rainfall.
Pb : Sidewall Dead weight
The replacement of pumps with screws requires Pb’ : Water pressure if the SAS is fill
major work of demolition, of earthmoving and Pr : Raft Dead weight
construction, technical and difficult enough that Pr’ : Water pressure if the SAS is fill
they cannot stop the operation of the locks and Qe : Water thrust
the navigation. Qt : Earth thrust
S : under pressure of the raft and
Unlike a hydroelectric plant, the Archimède sidewall
screw does not have a large water difference. It R : Soil reaction
just takes an offset of 1.5 meters to 4 meters to
install it as long as the flow of the stream is
greater than 10 m3 per second. The installations Conclusions
generally have a power between 25 and 2,000
kW. This type of device mainly corresponds to In conclusion, the Viesville lock was created to
very flat areas. allow boats of up to 1350 tonnes to pass from
one basin level to another by means of various
4.3. Type of foundations
structural and technical elements such as the
It is necessary to study the type of soil before Archimedean screw, the suspended gates with
digging and laying foundations. Sound rock has lateral displacement or the sidewalls. These
a sufficiently high capacity. allow us to take up forces such as land and water
pressure or to generate energy or to manage the
Projected situation: water level. The city is currently planning to
renovate this lock to improve it.

Resources
[P.RIGO,V.HERBILLON,2010]P.RIGO,
V.HERBILLON:(<< Voies navigables et
constructions hydrauliques : Bajoyers,
radier,têtes>>) Website :
CoursConstructionhydraulique.pdf
(ulg.ac.be). Consulted on 23/03/2022
[Besix,/]Besix:(<< Les trois écluses : Canal
Bruxelles-Charleroi>>) Website : Les
In the SAS, we use a raft and 2 sidewalls as a Trois Ecluses - BESIX. Consulted on
foundation. The sidewalls are built in open 20/03/2022

GH4T 10 May 2021

[Les 4 écluses, JL Deru (photographe), 2021]
(« Écluse Viesville – Canal Charleroi
Bruxelles ») Website : Écluse de
Viesville – Quatre écluses (quatre-
ecluses.be). Consulted on 21/03/2022
[Tractebel,Greish,Arias,2021]
Tractebel,Greish,Arias:(<< Viesville –
Canal Charleroi-Bruxelles PROJET
SEINE-ESCAUT>>) Website :190219-
RIP-20210409-Viesville (pontacelles.be)
Consulted on 23/03/2022
[Thomas Gernay, 2009] Thomas Gernay:(<<
Aménagement de la voie navigable «
Seine-Escaut Est»>>) Website :
TFE_SEE_Gernay (uliege.be) Consulted
on 22/03/2022

GH4T 10 May 2021