Mazeh water tower, Water tower and heritage site in Tel Aviv, Israel
Mazeh water tower is a 16-metre reinforced-concrete tower at 36 Mazeh Street, built in 1924. Eight concrete columns support a round 400-cubic-metre tank at the top, reached by a central staircase, with three fenced viewing balconies along the shaft. The lower part is enclosed by walls between the columns, and a spiral path now leads from street level to the entrance.
Tel Aviv's first water tower stood at the end of Rothschild Boulevard, 19 m above sea level with two 150 m³ tanks. In 1920, as the town grew toward 10,000 residents, the committee commissioned engineers Kerr and Weylin to plan a larger tower on a kurkar hill north of the built area. Arpad Gut's office designed it and it opened in 1924, feeding water to the houses.
The tower's lower section housed a veterans' scouts club, a cover for the Haganah, which used the roof to signal neighbouring settlements by Morse code or semaphore. Later a Hanukkah menorah was lit on top. Since 2020 the nearby Hilel center has used the site for exhibitions.
The tower stands at 36 Mazeh Street, set back from the street on a raised platform reached by a spiral access path built after the 2013 restoration. It is surrounded by six- and seven-storey residential buildings, so it no longer stands out on the skyline. The site was locked by the Tel Aviv municipality in June 2020 after neighbours complained about noise, until the nearby HILA centre began using it for exhibitions.
In its early years the tower served the Haganah, which used it to signal neighbouring settlements by Morse code or semaphore; a veterans' scouts club operated on the ground floor as cover. Later a Hanukkah menorah was lit on the roof each December.
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