Paris: It has no spire, stained-glass windows or central section, but a cavernous underground stormwater facility opened Thursday in the French capital ahead of the Paris Olympics, drawing comparisons to Notre Dame Cathedral.
The massive new structure, 30 meters (100 feet) underground next to the train station, is a key part of efforts to clean up the Seine River, which will host swimming events at the Paris Games in July and August.
“This is a real cathedral. This is something special,” said Paris Mayor Anne Hidalgo Thursday as she walked around the base of the cylinder-shaped construction, more than three years in the making.
Paris deputy mayor Antoine Guillou compared the Paris project near the Austerlitz transport hub to Notre Dame, which was rebuilt after a devastating fire in 2019.
“I mean we are building two cathedrals,” he told reporters during a visit in mid-March.
“At Notre Dame, it’s upstairs where everyone knows, and then it’s underground.”
Notre Dame will not be ready for the Paris Games immediately after President Emmanuel Macron began tearing down the 850-year-old monument.
Fortunately for Olympic open water swimming, the storm water facility will be operational in June after a trial run later this month.
The goal is to retain stormwater during heavy rains, reducing the need to discharge pathogen-rich contents from the sewer system directly into the Seine.
