Control Room Mezzanine

A mezzanine level inside one of the control rooms at Shimizusawa Thermal Power Plant runs along the upper level of the room, accessed from the floor below by a steel-grating stair. The mezzanine carries the secondary instrumentation cabinets and a small operator desk, with the view across the room reaching down to the main control panel and the marble switchboards below. The steel grating decking is darkened from years of foot traffic. The handrails along the open side of the mezzanine are painted in the standard industrial green, worn back to bare metal at the grip points. From the mezzanine, the whole layout of the control room is visible at a glance.

Mezzanines in early-twentieth-century power-station control rooms were a common way of fitting both the operator and the secondary equipment into a single high-ceilinged space. The mezzanine in this photograph carried the supervisor's working position at Shimizusawa, with the floor below holding the duty operators on shift. The plant ran from 1926 to 1990. After closure the mezzanine stopped carrying foot traffic. The instrument cabinets, the desk, and the structural arrangement have stayed in place. The view across the empty room is clearer now than it ever was during operation, with the working equipment quiet and the dust settling on every surface.