Lake Gőtés

Gőtés Lake is located in Budapest's District III, next to the Békásmegyer housing estate. Over the years it has almost completely disappeared, but its fate seems to be improving. Many protected animals are found here.

Location

Gőtés Lake is situated at the foot of Róka Hill, in the southern part of Békásmegyer Ófalu, between Honvéd Street, Hegyláb Street, Mező Street and the Budapest Electric Works Mező Street transformer station.

The Past

The lake is relatively recent. In the 1930s it was a marshy meadow without buildings that extended all the way to Csillaghegy, with a small layered spring emerging in its north‑west corner.

Older maps also referred to it as “Békás‑spring” or “Róka‑spring”. The spring water flowed into the Békási Creek and then into the Csillaghegy Ditch.

The original large marshy meadow has by now almost vanished.

The overwhelming part of the lake was filled in 1977.

After the construction was completed, the area was not landscaped; instead, all kinds of rubble began to be dumped around it.

The habitat of the aquatic plants and the animals that settled there became increasingly restricted, eventually limited only to the area around the ELMŰ site.

The Dilapidated State

Since 1987 a struggle has been underway to save the small green island.

The Honvéd Street spring that supplies water to the small reed bed was first covered up by the construction of the housing estate between 1971 and 1983. Later the water broke through again in two smaller pits.

In 1992 the illegal waste dump was eliminated, but the habitat almost disappeared again in 1994 because of pollution.

From the 1980s onward, the area around the lake began to be built up with family houses. The newcomers were disturbed by the neglected environment.

Saving the Lake

In 1996 the cleaning and rehabilitation of the lake system began. The rehabilitation of Gőtés Lake started in the autumn of 1996 as a joint initiative of the local municipality, the Guckler Károly Nature Conservation Foundation, active local residents, teachers and their students.

By the end of 1997 the land reclamation was completed. Four interrelated water surfaces were created, which are connected by smaller channels, and the water levels were regulated by the installation of sluices.

The lake is rich in organic matter. Its fauna includes several protected species.

Dragonflies, amphibians, riparian reptiles and riparian birds all live here.