Sender Wehrden

Sender Wehrden stands in a wooded area south-east of Wehrden, a district of Völklingen in the Saarland. It sits beside the A 620 motorway at the Völklingen-Geislautern interchange. The site once carried television signals for the ARD network to nearby Geislautern. Before digital switchover it broadcast analogue channels from this single mast. After DVB-T arrived the old aerial was removed and the mast fell silent. The installation was built to extend public-service television into the Saar valley. It relayed programmes produced by the Saarländischer Rundfunk, the regional broadcaster. For decades it formed part of the regional network that kept viewers in Völklingen and surrounding villages connected. When terrestrial television moved to digital multiplexes the mast was taken out of service. No replacement antenna replaced it, leaving only the steel lattice tower standing among the trees. Visitors today find a tall, grey lattice mast rising above the forest canopy. The concrete access road still winds through the woods to its base. No broadcasting equipment remains on the tower, and the surrounding area is quiet woodland. The site offers no museum or viewing platform, just a piece of retired infrastructure in a peaceful setting. From the edge of the wood there are long views across the Saar valley towards Völklingen. The mast itself is a reminder of the decades when television signals travelled from such places before satellites and fibre took over.