LAUWERSMEER

The Lauwersmeer National Park (2003) is located on the border of the provinces of Groningen and Friesland.
The Lauwersmeer was created in 1969 by the closure of the Lauwers Sea. The main reason for this closure was safety. After the flood of 1953, the Rijkswaterstaat had to choose whether to raise the dikes around the Lauwers Sea to delta height or to close the sea arm. Under pressure, particularly from the Frisian population, the latter was chosen. The people of Groningen, especially the residents of Zoutkamp, were less pleased with the closure at the time, as the shrimp fleet and the port of the village had to be moved to the new harbor of Lauwersoog.
After the closure, the elevated seabed (which previously belonged to the mud flats) became dry. In the first years, large parts of this were almost left to their fate, creating a lot of nature. In later years, large-scale forest planting occurred locally. The open plains around the Lauwersmeer are kept short by large grazers.
In addition to a 13-kilometer-long closure dam, sluices and a lock had to be built. These sluices are nothing more than 12 large concrete tubes through the seawall, each with a diameter of 10 meters. At low tide in the Wadden Sea, the sluices can discharge excess water into the Wadden Sea under natural fall. During rising water and/or storms, the sluices close.

In the photo: Sluices Lauwersmeer

Biker