LORBERER ÁRPÁD
Budapest III. kerületi Önkormányzat Környezetvédelmi és Természetvédelmi Bizottságának tagja - Magyarország
3rd District Municipality, member of the Commitee Environment and Natural - Hungary
Barlangokkal kapcsolatos környezeti problémák Óbuda-Békásmegyeren
Environmental problems related to the Caves of Óbuda-Békásmegyer, North West Budapest
Budapest III. kerületének a területén található a főváros legfontosabb barlangjainak egyike, a Mátyás-barlang, számos kisebb barlang és fontos karsztjelenség, víznyelők, karsztforrások valamint mindezek természet- és környezetvédelmi gondjai. Az ezen a téren kifejtett erőfeszítések komoly eredményeket hoztak, ám folyamatosan nyomasztó a pénzügyi alapok hiánya.
Óbuda-Békásmegyer, the Third district of Budapest is located on the Northwestern part of the Hungarian capital, on the right side of the Danube, at the edge of the Buda- and Pilis Mountains. The central part of these districts is the oldest inhabited area of Budapest, where important cities existed even in ancient times. The name of the ancient! Celtic town Akink, as well as the Roman name Aquincum meant "plenty of water". The place received these names because of the thermal karstic springs at the feet of the mountains. These thermal springs have a definitive role in the whole 2000-year history and development of Budapest.
The main karst hydrological characteristics of that area are shown at the detailed karst water-level map (Figure l) This map shows the conditions of the first of January 1997. The black rectangles on the map are the caves, the sinkhole at Üröm and the springs are the triangles.
Here the river Danube represents the base level (discharge zone) of regional groundwater flows of the main (Mesozoic) karstic reservoir system of the Central Transdanubian Mountains. The recharge of these waters are originated from the infiltration into the limestone and dolomite outcrops of the mountains. The infiltrated precipitation has to flow along deep flow-paths and a significant part of them are flowing through the Mesozoic basement under the sedimentary basins adjacent to the open karstic terrain. Through this long and deep way the water is warmed up and ascends to the surface in natural thermal karstic springs along the border of mountains, next to the Danube fault-zone.
According to the caves and the travertine-terraces, the thermal spring activity began at the age of the Pliocene, and shifted eastward parallel to the cyclic uprising of the mountain blocks. As a result, the oldest (inactive, fossil) caves are in the highest places, far from the active springs. Most of the caves of Óbuda were found in the limestone quarries that operated at the edge of the city in the 19th century. Today the inhabited part of the city is extending out to the hills, so more and more engineering, geological and environmental problems caused by the presence of caves can be met.
Until 1950 all the largest hydrothermal caves of Budapest were in the Third district, so all the natural protection, tourist, engineering, geological and other problems existed since the thirties in the Óbuda area, especially around the Rózsadomb (Rose Hill). After the shifting of the limits of some districts, there were still several local environmental conflicts in residential areas on the mountain slopes. The forbidding of sewage dumping at the open caustic areas was ordered in 1964, but still hard to comply with until now. (There has been much more construction without official permission on the mountain slops then in any other district of Buda.)
The Tábor-hegyi Cave was formed in Upper Triassic dolomite about one million years ago . This cave has been known a long time. It is located 340 meter high above sea level in a forested area without buildings, but very near to the houses. First the entrance hall and the connecting 40 m fracture system was excavated with the aim of paleontological research in the late 19205
