Stretch park

Plan of the Dehnepark, Vienna

Dehnepark, in the background the ruined villa

The ruined villa

The Dehnepark is a nature park-like park in the 14th district of Penzing in Vienna with an area of around 50,000 m². The park is part of the Vienna Woods and is unique due to its old tree population and habitat. It is located in the Rosental on the eastern slope of Hütteldorf's local mountain , the Satzberg , and on the opposite side on the slopes of the Steinhof fewer .

The valley is crossed by the Rosenbach , where a toad migration takes place every spring . The center of the Dehnepark is formed by the artificially dammed expansion pond and the large meadow below, which has been enlarged by the recent arching of the Rosenbach. The pond is an important habitat for the red-eared slider turtle that has become home here . The Rosenbach stream is also of great ecological importance; although it is currently partially blocked, it creates swamp-like habitats in some places.

history

The Dehnepark was originally built as a landscape garden for Princess Maria Antoine Paar (née Liechtenstein). It was designed by Friedrich Mayern between 1791 and 1804. It was originally built in the style of an English landscape garden . Various buildings - such as temples, pavilions, grottos - and buildings gave the park a Biedermeier romantic character. These elements of garden design largely disappeared again in the 19th and 20th centuries, with the exception of the neo-Gothic ruined villa from the late 18th century.

The park got its name from the confectioner August Dehne . He earned very well in the 19th century with his pastry shop on Michaelerplatz (later the Demel pastry shop on Kohlmarkt ), so he invested the income in the large, wooded property near Hütteldorf. Decades later, the Viennese film director Willi Forst bought this site and built a villa there. After the Second World War , the Vienna community showed interest in the slowly overgrown park, bought it from Forst in 1969 and made it accessible to the public from 1973. Since then, the Dehnepark has been in the administration and care of the City of Vienna's Forestry Office ( Magistratsabteilung 49), which also has a significant impact on the design philosophy (the areas managed by MA 49 are only looked after with a fraction of the financial and horticultural effort required by the City Garden Office , MA 42, turns to his parks).

Current usage and problems

The Biedermeier garden contained various buildings and accessories, which were later largely removed - a display panel in the Penzing district museum

The Dehnepark is an important local recreation area in connection with the area at the Silbersee and the Steinhofgrund. A landmark of the park is a plane tree in the central meadow area with a crown diameter of about thirty meters. There is also an incense cedar and a tulip tree . The Dehnepark is one of their “in-places” for the Hütteldorfer youth. The use of the ruined villa is an unsolved problem. In 1999 the responsible MA 49 - Forestry Office and Agricultural Company of the City of Vienna considered using it as a museum or forest school, but considerations in this regard petered out. Also recurring articles in the mighty Kronen-Zeitung , for example, campaign-like, in April and May 2003 (“Vom Denkmal zum Schandfleck”, “Who will finally wake the Forst-Villa out of its slumber?” Etc.), remained inconclusive. It is said that there is no utilization concept for the listed building. The gastronomic use of the building seems to be excluded in principle, as is the case with the neighboring Steinhof grounds. The municipal forest office, with its inclination towards the economical and natural design of the transferred green spaces, which in itself makes a lot of sense, is obviously confronted with a challenge that is difficult to master.