Like Many other towns and cities in Virginia, the city of Harrisonburg was built on a creek;  in this case, Black's Run. Streams were important to early towns in Virginia, because the provided both a source of drinking water and an easy means of waste disposal, as well as water for livestock and hydropower for mills. Harrisonburg originally grew up around the creek, and as time went on stretches of creek were covered over to make way for development. A large portion of Black's Run in covered or routed though pipes or tunnels, but not continuously - there's a long section of storm drain, followed by several hundred yards of open creek, and then a short length of tunnel, then more open creek, and so on through the length of the city.

This drain is pretty large - even the upstream most infall is a pair of 6' corrugated steel arches, which soon transition to three 6' square pipes, then a pair of big 8' corrugated steel arches. The downstream stretches of tunnel are square, with walls and floor varying between rock and concrete construction.

The most interesting stretch of drain tunnel is where the creek runs beneath the heart of downtown. The tunnel is 15' tall in places, and around 30' wide. This is where I had a little accident...

I entered this section of drain through the infall, and worked my way downstream, trying to stay as dry as possible. Eventually that became impossible, and I had to wade through shin-deep water along one wall of the drain. The water was gross... very murky, and full of floating leaves and trash. I worked my way downstream to the outfall without trouble, then turned around and headed back upstream towards the infall. I took things a little differently this time - instead of walking along the tunnel wall at the deepest water, I decided to avoid the floating debris and walk across the middle of the tunnel. "Wow," I though to myself, "It's a good thing that this tunnel has a nice flat floor, because I can't see through the water at all!" Almost immediately, the tunnel floor dropped off steeply into a deep pit. I have no idea just how deep it is, I never hit the bottom - luckily I was able to catch myself before I sank more than waist-deep.

Moral of the story? When draining, expect the unexpected, and always bring a dry change of clothes (or an inflatable raft!).

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