Morphology of Water Bodies – Overall Assessment (WRRL) 2011

Map description

Watercourses

Due to the urbanised character of large areas of the federal state of Berlin, the morphology of Berlin’s watercourses is mostly strongly to totally modified (see Table 2).

Tab. 2: Morphological state of investigated watercourses in the federal state of Berlin

The best overall assessment has been assigned to the Kuhlake, a little stream located in a forested area (Spandauer Forst) which has been "remodelled" back into a more natural state a few years ago. It is the only watercourse in Berlin that encompasses a number of unmodified segments.

Among the natural watercourse of relevance to the EU-WFD, the best average morphological assessment (3.9, distinctively modified) has been found for the Tegeler Fließ. A better overall assessment is often hampered by the poor assessments of the river bed morphology. Figure 2 shows two examples representing marginally modified and totally modified watercourse segments.

Fig. 1a: Tegeler Fließ, segment 85 near the district of Lübars characterised by a “marginally modified” morphology

Fig. 1b: Panke, segment 22 in the district of Wedding (near Badstraße), characterised by a “totally modified” morphology

Lake shores

The morphology of the Berlin lake shores is mostly "moderately modified" or "distinctively modified" (see Table 3). Morphology-wise, Berlin’s lake shores are thus in a significantly better state than the watercourses. This may be partly due to the fact that the lakes are often located outside the most heavily urbanised areas. Additionally, a significant amount of the lake shores is under specific protection regimes, resulting in reduced constructional activities in the shore zones. A problem area concerns ship-induced wave action which has a significant potential for morphology degradation. A specific reed protection program has been in force for many years to counteract these negative effects.

Tab. 3: Morphological state of the lake shores in the federal state of Berlin. The division into lakes, basins and sub-basins was adopted from the Gewässeratlas Berlin [SenStadt, 2002]

Contiguous areas of "marginally modified" lake shore segments are mostly found on the Unterhavel around the Pfaueninsel, in the northern parts of Seddinsee and along the southern shore of Müggelsee. Figure 3 shows two examples representing marginally modified and totally modified lake shore segments.

Fig. 2a: Seddinsee, “marginally modified” segment 98 located on the south-eastern shore

Fig. 2b: Müggelsee, “totally modified” segment 5 on the northern shore in the district of Friedrichshagen