The cramped streets of classic European cities are great for old-world charm. They're not great for traffic, especially when you're driving a beer delivery truck through those ancient passageways. That's why Bruges, Belgium came up with a better solution: the beer pipeline.
De Halve Maan Brewery, a centuries-old beer-maker, is the sole brewery remaining within the city center of Bruges. The tight space there, however, means that while the beer is brewed downtown, it's bottled elsewhere, two miles away. Rather thank driving trucks back and forth through some of the most congested streets in Europe, the brewery will soon move its delectable brew via the pipeline at a speed of more than 1,000 gallons per hour.
It cost about $4.5 million to build the beer pipeline, with more than $300,000 kicked in by Kickstarter supporters. Xavier Vanneste, the head of De Halve Maan, told Wired the project had to conduct all kinds of surveys and studies to make sure the digging wouldn't disturb any of the priceless centuries-old buildings in Bruges. In the end the project was helped out by the city's ancient network of canals—sections of the pipeline are under the water there, running past the oblivious swans.
Source: Wired
Andrew's from Nebraska. His work has also appeared in Discover, The Awl, Scientific American, Mental Floss, Playboy, and elsewhere. He lives in Brooklyn with two cats and a snake.
