And here we have the next endangered landmark, the Niinivaara water tower. Built in 1957, it strongly divided opinions. It was also in a very bad shape, which resulted in the need of a replacement. That replacement is currently built behind it.
The old tower was demolished in the summer of 2025 when its successor was completed. But before it was completed, I was sent to write an article about the building of its successor. I travelled to Joensuu on a very cold winter day in early 2024, when all train traffic in Finland had come to a halt because of a broken rail damaging train wheels. I travelled 10 hours by bus.
The office of the construction site was located in a duplex. Its roof is visible right above the transformer in the lower left corner of the picture. It wasn’t just any duplex, it was the house of local giant entrepreneurs Yrjö and Reino Laakkonen. It had two wings with multiple bedrooms, one for the family of each brother. They were connected with a sauna area with a pool.
After the death of the brothers, the house was left vacant, and sold to a local construction company, who intended to replace it with a block of flats. The company rented the other half of the house to the company building the water tower.
I was given a tour in the building, but sadly didn’t take any photos. After all, it was company time.