Arks
Well-known member
- Joined
- May 22, 2010
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As many of you know, I'm currently modifying a circa 1900 building to create a vacation rental "guesthouse". One of the rooms that will become a bedroom has a concrete floor that's rough and uneven. The architect decided to jackhammer it out and pour a new slab with a proper vapor barrier under it.
Yesterday the worker started jackhammering in the center of the floor. As soon as he broke through the 4-inch concrete layer, he almost lost his jackhammer into "black nothingness". They enlarged the hole enough to get a light and a head in and discovered they'd uncovered a long-abandoned cistern , and it's HUGE. For those who don't know what a cistern is, it's basically an underground water tank, a reservoir. In the old days before we had a city water system, people would build these underground holding tanks and channel rainwater into them to serve as a water source for the building.
This cistern is round, made of brick and lined with very smooth plaster. It's like an underground grain silo, 8 feet (2,44 meters) in diameter and 16 feet (5 meters) deep. It’s the size of the trailer of a tractor-trailer truck, sunk into the ground vertically! I calculate it would have held 6000 gallons (23.000 liters) of water. I cannot imagine why they stored that much water, unless they were selling it to their neighbors.
Anyway, what to do with it? The contractor wants to fill it in with sand and pour the new concrete slab over it. But it's such an amazing work of craftsmanship, I hate to think of it lost forever. One option would be to put a spiral staircase in it, light it, and make it a feature for interested guests to study. Of course the top of the stairs would need a rail around the opening like any staircase, and a child gate. But I know you're going to say that would be a strange thing to have in a bedroom.
Another option would be to cover it with a vapor barrier and concrete so it's capped off safely, but still there in case someone wanted to open it up in the future. I just hate to fill it in and forget it because it took such a huge effort for someone to build it!
Yesterday the worker started jackhammering in the center of the floor. As soon as he broke through the 4-inch concrete layer, he almost lost his jackhammer into "black nothingness". They enlarged the hole enough to get a light and a head in and discovered they'd uncovered a long-abandoned cistern , and it's HUGE. For those who don't know what a cistern is, it's basically an underground water tank, a reservoir. In the old days before we had a city water system, people would build these underground holding tanks and channel rainwater into them to serve as a water source for the building.
This cistern is round, made of brick and lined with very smooth plaster. It's like an underground grain silo, 8 feet (2,44 meters) in diameter and 16 feet (5 meters) deep. It’s the size of the trailer of a tractor-trailer truck, sunk into the ground vertically! I calculate it would have held 6000 gallons (23.000 liters) of water. I cannot imagine why they stored that much water, unless they were selling it to their neighbors.
Anyway, what to do with it? The contractor wants to fill it in with sand and pour the new concrete slab over it. But it's such an amazing work of craftsmanship, I hate to think of it lost forever. One option would be to put a spiral staircase in it, light it, and make it a feature for interested guests to study. Of course the top of the stairs would need a rail around the opening like any staircase, and a child gate. But I know you're going to say that would be a strange thing to have in a bedroom.
Another option would be to cover it with a vapor barrier and concrete so it's capped off safely, but still there in case someone wanted to open it up in the future. I just hate to fill it in and forget it because it took such a huge effort for someone to build it!