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Josef Gottschall's mind was in the gutter. Four years ago, he had just become publicity manager at Vienna's sewer company and was struggling for inspirations to promote it.
'Everything is below ground and your product is . . .' unmentionable, Mr. Gottschall says.
Fortunately, the classic 1949 film with Orson Welles, 'The Third Man,' climaxes in a dramatic chase through Vienna's sewers. Capitalizing on that, Mr. Gottschall launched a Third Man Tour of the subterranean waterways. Today, it's an underground hit.
Vienna isn't alone in plumbing the depths of tourism. A local chamber of commerce in Brighton, England, in 2007 voted the city's sewers the 'Best Place to Visit.' The living monument to Victorian engineering and architecture topped other attractions including the Duke of York's Picturehouse, one of Britain's oldest cinemas.
Brussels in 2007 renovated its sewer museum, whose exterior resembles a Greek temple. Underneath, visitors can stroll unaccompanied along a redolent sluiceway.
And the wellspring of sewer tourism, Paris's Musee des Egouts, plans a makeover to handle rising traffic, which surpasses 100,000 visitors a year.
Museum officials, who are all sewer workers, aim to expand their exhibits on topics including water treatment, safety equipment and unexpected discoveries.
One display in the spacious sewer tunnels celebrates notable items retrieved, including swords, stolen handbags and false teeth. Another commemorates Eleanor, a 32-inch alligator, whom workers caught in 1984 and who now lives in a Paris zoo.
Tours of the city's sewers, already famous from Victor Hugo's 'Les Miserables,' began in 1867, when a revolutionary, modernized network collected only rainwater. Workers clad in white guided visitors aboard special tour barges and wagons.
'It was very chic,' says museum spokeswoman Marie-Christine Amable. 'We had beautiful sewers.' Toilet waste came in 1894, but the rides continued for 80 years.
Sewer museum officials around Europe say they're flush with visitors now thanks in part to environmental concerns. People are increasingly curious about how their waste is handled. Water authorities are capitalizing on the attention to teach citizens they shouldn't do things like pour oil and grease down the drain.
'We can show the public what flows by in raw sewage,' says Brighton sewer tour guide Stuart Slark.
But celebrating effluent management poses unusual curatorial challenges. Constant moisture and noxious chemicals ruin displays. Heavy rains flood galleries. Deadly and explosive gases can build up, forcing hasty evacuations. Rats run rampant.
'It's not so easy to prepare the sewer for visitors,' says Mr. Gottschall in Vienna, an engineer who once designed sanitary works. 'The safety instruction book is like this,' he adds, holding his thumb and forefinger an inch apart.
But danger and noisome corridors don't deter tourists bored with churches and monuments.
'Everybody does the Arc de Triomphe,' said Harry Chlebos, a retiree from Phoenix, while examining the City of Light's dark underbelly. Older Americans know of Paris's sewers, he added, from a reference to them decades ago in an episode of 'The Honeymooners,' in which sewer worker Ed Norton dresses up as the man he claims designed them.
Young Americans are also attracted. Museum manager Lionel Decaix says that about five years ago, two young fans of 'Jackass' TV shows and films, which feature people doing foolish stunts and pranks, hid in the museum at closing to make an amateur video. They immediately tripped alarms and had to be released by the police. 'Americans are very intrepid,' says Mr. Decaix.
So is Brighton native Steve Sparks, who proposed to his girlfriend, Carolyn Payne, during a tour of the city's sewer last May. 'I was a little nervous about losing the ring,' recalls the property developer, who dropped to one knee inside a cavernous red-brick storm drain. Mr. Sparks, who coordinated his plans with sewer-operator Southern Water, says he wanted to make the moment unusual.
'I believe that since the sewers were built in 1870, nobody has proposed in them,' says Mr. Sparks, 42.
Despite Ms. Payne's shock, she said yes. 'It's really quite beautiful and cathedral-like there,' says the November bride, who is 30. 'It does still smell,' she adds.
Odor also can't deter lovers of 'The Third Man' from following Orson Welles's footsteps down a spiral brick staircase. The film, a dark thriller involving murder, smuggling and deceit in the rubble of occupied Vienna, has long drawn fans above ground.
Brigitte Timmermann, author of a 420-page tome called 'The Third Man's Vienna,' has led tours dedicated to the movie, written by novelist Graham Greene, in her native city for years. The Third Man Museum, an exhaustive collection of artifacts and memorabilia amassed by a Viennese couple, opened in 2005.
When Mr. Gottschall shifted to promoting sewers in 2007, he quickly got together with Ms. Timmermann's Vienna Walks & Talks and the museum to offer a whole package. They all were thrilled finally to link with the sewer.
For his part, Mr. Gottschall scrambled to secure rights to show three minutes of the movie. A bigger challenge was installing lights and projectors that would automatically disconnect if chemical sensors detected dangerous gases, including carbon monoxide, methane and sulfuric acid. Switches are similar to miners' equipment and don't cause sparks, as normal circuits can.
Underground today, visitors first see a film about Vienna's sanitation and the tasks sewer workers perform, projected on the wall of a spacious sewage-filtering chamber. Then they see clips from 'The Third Man' in a nearby chamber, where several chase scenes were filmed. Finally, visitors spill out into the vast, vaulted tunnel that channels the Vienna River and that provided a memorable setting in the film.
Tour guides note that many sewer scenes were actually shot on a dry, odor-free soundstage in London. Crossing Vienna's underground without soaking beautifully polished wingtips -- as Mr. Welles' character does -- would be impossible, they explain.
Ashley Venzel, a 26-year-old English teacher from Ohio, took the tour on a recent day after watching 'The Third Man' with her boyfriend. She enjoyed it partly because 'it's not very touristy,' she said while removing the spelunker's helmet that visitors must don.
Mr. Sparks, the Brighton newlywed, looks forward to touring other cities' sanitary works. Vienna sounds interesting, he says, but Paris is particularly romantic. 'Maybe Paris for our first anniversary,' he says.
參考譯文：
約瑟夫•戈特沙爾( Josef Gottschall)的腦子一度混亂得如同迷宮似的下水道。那是在四年前，當時他剛剛成為維也納下水道公司的公關經理，苦苦尋找推廣公司形象的靈感。
戈特沙爾說，“一切都在地下，你的產品……難以說出口。”
幸運的是，1949年奧遜•威爾斯(Orson Welles)參演的經典影片《第三個人》(The Third Man)的高潮片段就是在維也納的下水道上演的一場驚險刺激的追逐戲。利用這一點，戈特沙爾推出了一項下水道“第三個人之旅”活動。如今，這已經成為一項非常成功的地下旅游活動。
維也納并不是唯一一個將旅游業往縱深方向拓展的城市。2007年，英國布里奇頓的一個本地商會投票將當地的下水道評選為“最佳游覽地”。布里奇頓的下水道是一個展現了維多利亞時期工程和建筑風格的鮮活的紀念館，其得票數超過了包括約克公爵影院(Duke of York's Picturehouse)在內的其他名勝古跡，后者是英國最古老的電影院之一。
2007年，布魯塞爾翻新了該市的下水道博物館，從外部來看，它就像是一座希臘神廟。在這座博物館底下，游客可以在無人陪伴的情況下獨自沿著一條氣味濃烈的泄水道漫步。
而下水道旅游的鼻祖──巴黎下水道博物館(Musee des Egouts)──則打算進行徹底翻新，以迎接不斷增加的客流。該博物館每年的客流量超過10萬人。
這個博物館的管理人員全都是下水道工人，他們打算擴大展覽范圍，主題包括污水處理、安全設備和意外發現。
在這片寬敞的下水道區域舉行的其中一次展覽是為了公開展示找回來的重要物品，包括刀劍、失竊的手袋和假牙。還有一次展覽是為了紀念埃莉諾(Eleanor)，它是一條身長32英寸的鱷魚，在1984年的時候被下水道工人抓住，目前生活在巴黎的一家動物園內。
巴黎的下水道早就因維克多•雨果(Victor Hugo)的名作《悲慘世界》(Les Miserables)而聞名于世，從1867年開始向游客開放。當時那個創新的、現代化的下水道網絡只是用來搜集雨水；身穿白衣的工作人員指引游客登上特殊的游船和車輛進行參觀。
巴黎下水道博物館發言人瑪麗-克麗絲婷•阿馬布林(Marie-Christine Amable)說，當時的下水道非常有格調，擁有漂亮的排水管道。廁所廢水從1894年開始排入這個下水道系統，但這股旅游熱潮還是持續了80年。
歐洲各個下水道博物館的管理人員都表示，現在他們那兒是游客盈門，這在一定程度上要歸功于環境問題引發的憂慮。人們對污水處理方式越來越感到好奇。水務管理當局正在利用人們對這個問題的關注來教育大家，將油脂倒進下水道之類的行為是不應該的。
布里奇頓下水道之旅的導游斯圖爾特•斯拉克(Stuart Slark)說，“我們可以向公眾展示未經處理的污水中有哪些東西流過。”
但是，如果要公開展示污水，會給展覽策劃帶來不同尋常的挑戰。持續散發出的濕氣和有毒化學物質會毀壞展品。暴雨會溢滿地下通道。致命的爆炸性氣體可能聚集，迫使游客緊急疏散。還會有耗子橫沖直撞，肆虐無忌。
維也納的戈特沙爾說，在下水道開門迎客前做好準備工作并不是件容易的事。他是一位工程師，曾經設計過衛生工程項目。他用拇指和食指比劃出一英寸的厚度說，“安全指導手冊有這么厚。”
但是，下水道中潛藏的危險和惡臭并沒有嚇退對教堂和紀念館這些地方感到厭倦的游客。
來自美國鳳凰城(Phoenix)的退休老人哈里•克勒伯斯(Harry Chlebos)在參觀“光明之城”巴黎的黑暗下水道時說，人人都去參觀凱旋門(Arc de Triomphe)，而年紀較大的美國人都知道巴黎的下水道，緣由是幾十年前的一部劇集《蜜月中人》(Honeymooners)。在這部情景喜劇中，下水道工人艾德•諾頓(Ed Norton)喬裝打扮成他所聲稱的巴黎下水道的設計者。
年輕的美國人也被這個地方所吸引。巴黎下水道博物館經理利昂內爾•德凱(Lionel Decaix)說，大約五年前，《蠢蛋搞怪秀》(Jackass)電視節目及系列電影的兩位元年輕粉絲在博物館關門時躲在里面，拍攝業余視頻。（《蠢蛋搞怪秀》展現的是一群人演出各種危險、荒謬、自殘的特技和搞笑情節。）他們馬上觸發了警報，員警來了才把他們解救了出來。德凱說，美國人真是勇猛無畏。
布里奇頓本地人、房地產開發商史蒂夫•斯巴克斯(Steve Sparks)也是這樣的一個勇敢者。去年5月，在游覽該市的下水道時，他向女朋友卡洛琳•佩恩(Carolyn Payne)求婚。當時，在一個紅磚砌成的暴雨排水洞內，他單膝跪下。他回憶道，“我有點擔心會把戒指丟了。”在下水道運營商Southern Water的配合協調下，斯巴克斯實施了求婚計劃。他說，他想讓這個時刻與眾不同。
現年42歲的斯巴克斯說，“我相信，自從這些下水道于1870年建成以來，還沒有人在里面求過婚。”
盡管佩恩感到很震驚，她還是接受了求婚，并在11月成為新娘。現年30歲的佩恩稱，“那里確實非常美，很像大教堂。”她又補充說，“不過確實有一股難聞的氣味。”
臭氣也不能阻止《第三個人》的粉絲們追隨奧遜•威爾斯的足跡沿著螺旋式下降的磚砌樓梯尋幽探秘。長期以來，這部在戰后維也納的瓦礫堆中拍攝的涉及謀殺、走私和欺詐的黑色驚悚片一直在吸引著粉絲們從地面上下來一探究竟。這部電影的編劇是小說家格雷厄姆•格林(Graham Greene)。
維也納人布麗奇特•蒂默曼恩(Brigitte Timmermann)曾撰寫過一部長達420頁的巨著《第三個人的維也納》(The Third Man's Vienna)。數年來，她一直在自己的家鄉推動以這部電影為主題的游覽活動。于2005年開業的第三個人博物館(The Third Man Museum)陳列了由一對維也納夫婦收集的有關這部電影的各式各樣的工藝制品和紀念物。
當戈特沙爾在2007年轉而從事下水道推廣業務時，他很快與蒂默曼恩的旅游公司Vienna Walks & Talks和第三個人博物館聯手，推出了一整套方案，所有激動人心的內容都和下水道有關。
戈特沙爾要做的工作包括爭取獲得在下水道放映電影《第三個人》三分鐘片段的授權。一個更大的挑戰是安裝電燈和放映機，如果化學物質感測器偵測出危險氣體（包括一氧化碳、甲烷和硫酸），這些電燈和放映機能夠自動斷電。這種電閘與礦工使用的設備類似，不會像普通的電路那樣引起火花。
如今，在維也納的地下世界，通過在一間寬敞的污水過濾室面上的投影，游客們首先可以觀看一部關于維也納公共衛生狀況以及下水道工人作業情況的電影。然后，在附近的一個排水洞里，他們可以觀看電影《第三個人》的片段，影片中的幾個追逐場面就是在這里拍攝的。最后，游客們魚貫而出，進入一條廣闊的拱頂隧道，這條隧道通向維也納河，是影片中一處令人印象深刻的取景點。
旅游指南指出，影片中的許多下水道場景實際上是在倫敦的一個干燥無異味的攝影棚內拍攝的。像威爾斯扮演的人物那樣穿越維也納的地下世界而不弄濕擦得鋥亮的皮鞋尖實際上是不可能的。
來自俄亥俄州的26歲的英文教師阿什麗•文澤爾(Ashley Venzel)在和男友一起觀看了影片《第三個人》后，最近也到此一游。她一邊摘下游客必須佩帶的洞窟探險頭盔一邊說，她享受這次旅行的部分原因是它的旅游味兒不是那么濃。
布里奇頓的新郎官斯巴克斯現在盼望著游覽其他城市的下水道工事。他說，維也納聽起來不錯，但巴黎特別浪漫。他說，也許在我們結婚一周年的時候會去參觀巴黎的下水道。
