Echo Falls is a culvert that take the Royds Brook underneath a housing estate near Rochdale. In a somewhat unique setup a small amount of the brook's water also flows above ground in a mock natural stream that runs amongst the houses.
It was first explored in 2011 by Stepping Lightly and a couple of things have changed since then. A large infall grill now protects one end, and the diverted stream above ground rejoins the culvert's flow as a curtain of water across the outfall. An umbrella is now required to get in without getting wet.
Three large concrete baffle blocks reside in a tall chamber, the top of which forms part of the waterfall for the mock stream above.
A few meters upstream is the namesake falls which had a pretty poor design. A ladder lead upto a platform opposite and just below the large incoming pipe, on which a large amount of debris had been deposited. The worst being a thick wood plank which had possibly been responsible for flattening the safety rails along the platform. There was no offical way of progressing across the gap so the plank proved quite helpful.
Moving upstream was a series of straight concete pipes linking manhole chambers where the direction changed to match the mock stream above.
A diversion channel above the infall sends a small amount of flow along the mock stream, and anything more goes down the culvert.
