Depths of Salvation
My refined and highly motivated drain-finding abilities made yesterday's trip to Depths of Salvation possible. Guided by bits of information and clues elsewhere on the internet and other resources, I was able to determine the approximate path of the pipe from its outfall in the massive park along the 401. Entry through the outfall is basically impossible as it's a giant waterslide that pours into the valley. Terapr0 and myself were able to find the correct upstream manhole with virtually no difficulty. Having only a hunch where it could be, I was anticipating a long, muggy hike through prickly foliage. We were most relieved to descend into the cool, breezy drain and out of the sticky summer day. That feeling seemed to reward the brevity of our search.
The glorious outfall.
Graffiti dates between the mid 60's to the late 80's. This drain has seen a lot of activity from the neighbourhood youth over the years. On the platform of one of the upstream access chambers is a pile of old beer cans with outdated logos and a tag from 1988.
Outfall chamber
Some rather interesting mineral deposits. The pipe must have been leaking at one point but it seems that the buildup of hardened deposits sealed those leaks up.
Once the drain passes beneath residential streets, the pipe is 40-50 feet underground. Roadside storm pipes empty into the drain via cascading dropshafts like the one pictured above. The tiered system absorbs the constant flow of water as not to erode the bottom surfaces. It's very wet, too. What you see above isn't even a third of the depth.
Where the drop shaft meets the main conduit.
After heading back out the way we came, we tried, in vain, to find the outfall from the surface. What should have been an easy hike along the approximate path of the pipe, ended up being a two hour wander through the gigantic park taking every possible wrong turn.
We ended up here where a combined sewer trickles questionable water into the ravine, except the ravine (the path to the right caged in stones) is completely dry. We ended up following it out of curiosity.
Only the memory of water remains
What we were also following was a small sanitary line, which we popped a lid near the combined sewer outfall. This may explain why the ravine is dry--the city buried and converted it to a sewer it to use the convenient land grade. This sort of thing happens all the time and we're not aware of it. Although, I doubt it happens much anymore, there are numerous examples of this around the city. There are hints of the former Garrison Creek in Christie Pits, Trinity Bellwoods and Fort York; a major portion of Wilket Creek, which apparently is still on maps where it shouldn't, was buried after it flooded during Hurrican Hazel (this resulted in "Gargantua") and you can trace its former path along the surface.