Werdenfels hard stone plant

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Aerial view of the excavation pit in May 2016

The Werdenfels hard stone works was a quarry on the Lange Köchel in the Murnauer Moos near Eschenlohe north of the Werdenfelser Land . The company, which was founded in 1930 and closed in 2000, was at times the most important supplier of rail and road ballast in southern Bavaria. The hard rock was marketed under the trade name glauco quartzite .

history

Flooded Pit (2011)

The company was founded in 1927 by August Peisl (Neubeuert) and Georg Tilger (Weilheim) and began production in August 1930 on the Langen Köchel, an approximately 120-meter-high Ice Age round hump on the western edge of the Murnauer Moos. In 1929/1930, a 4.1 kilometer long cable car was built between the plant and a loading point on the Munich-Garmisch railway line . Among other things, it crossed the later federal highway 2 and from 1972 crossed under the federal highway 95 . After the economically difficult early years, the company was taken over in 1934 by the Süddeutsche Basaltwerke Immendingen, which made it profitable. Due to major orders from the Deutsche Reichsbahn, the plant achieved its highest sales figure of around 750,000 tons per year in 1941/42, with foreign and forced laborers as well as French prisoners of war being used. Another crisis after the end of the war meant that the company was transferred to Gebr. Späth and Gehrmann in 1947.

From 1967 onwards, large quantities of track ballast were supplied for the subway construction and for the expansion of the S-Bahn network in Munich. In 1972 the aboveground mining area on the southern flank was exhausted and an expansion to further areas on the northwestern flank of the Langen Köchel was not possible for nature conservation reasons. In the following years, a pit that was finally 40 meters deep, 50 meters wide and 1.1 kilometers long was dug below ground level. In 1981 the construction group Hochtief took over the company. After the surrounding Murnauer Moos had already been declared a nature reserve in 1980 and every development of new mining fields finally failed in 1994, production was stopped in 2000. After the company closed, there were demands to keep sections of the cable car and the 300-seat dining room of the plant built in 1953 as industrial monuments, but neither was realized and the demolition should be completely implemented. Due to a population of nesting bats that were sighted in the former canteen, the demolition of the canteen was stopped for nature conservation reasons. In the remaining front part (which is in danger of collapsing), bats still breed in summer. The remaining open pit was completely flooded after a few years. The Himmelsteich , now known as Langer-Köchel-See , has no surface inflows or outflows and draws its water from groundwater infiltration and precipitation. The water surface is at an altitude of 628  m above sea level. NN . North of the lake, the terrain rises steeply to 710  m above sea level. NN at.

The quarry at Langen Köchel has been designated as a valuable geotope (180A004) by the Bavarian State Office for the Environment .

Flora and fauna

Bay at the western end of the pit

After more than a decade, nature has slowly discovered the body of water for itself. Carp-like fish up to a length of approx. 40 cm can be observed spawning in protected areas close to the water surface.

Many amphibians also use the groundwater lake in the Murnau Moos for reproduction.

The long simmer in May 2016

Water birds are rarely found. However, it can be assumed that the existing fish population was introduced through the plumage of birds.

Web links

Commons : Langer Köchel  - Collection of images, videos and audio files
Commons : Quarry at Langen Köchel in the Murnauer Moor  - collection of images, videos and audio files

literature

  • Peter Schwarz: Eschenloh Stone Age . The hard stone works in Werdenfels was closed. In: Deutsches Museum (Ed.): Culture & Technology . Issue 2, 2001, ISSN  0344-5690 , p. 58–61 ( deutsches-museum.de [PDF; 3.8 MB ; accessed on October 29, 2018]).
  • Brigitte Salmen, Sandra Uhrig, Ingrid Scharl: Industry and nature - the history of the Werdenfels hard stone works in the Murnauer Moos. Accompanying volume for the special exhibition in the Murnau Castle Museum from December 15, 2000 to February 25, 2001. Edited by the Murnau Castle Museum . Murnau 2000, ISBN 3-932276-09-4 .

Individual evidence

  1. ↑ Hubert Engelbrecht: The hard stone works Werdenfels and the Lange Köchel in the Murnau-Eschenloher Moos. (No longer available online.) In: geoberg.de. September 15, 2004, archived from the original on November 10, 2013 ; retrieved on October 28, 2018 : "This text was published on September 15, 2004 on the old version of geoberg.de and has been adopted."
  2. ↑ Industry and nature. On the history of the Werdenfels hard stone works in the Murnauer Moos. In: schlossmuseum-murnau.de. Murnau Castle Museum, accessed on May 8, 2019 (exhibition archive).
  3. Jump up ↑ Bund nature conservation in Bavaria : The Köchel doom - opencast mine in the Murnauer Moos. In: bund-naturschutz.de, accessed on November 7, 2013.
  4. ^ Günter Bitala: Searching for traces in the Murnauer Moos. In: The world . December 14, 2000, accessed November 7, 2013.
  5. ↑ Information board at the former cafeteria.
  6. ↑ Heiner Schuster: Say goodbye quietly when you say goodbye. (No longer available online.) In: mineralienfreunde.de. Munich Mineral Friends e. V., September 25, 2002, archived from the original on June 17, 2018 ; accessed on October 28, 2018 .
  7. ↑ Bavarian State Office for the Environment: Geotop 180A004, quarry at Langen Köchel in the Murnauer Moos. In: Umweltatlas.bayern.de, accessed on November 21, 2019.

Coordinates: 47 ° 37 ′ 50.5 ″  N , 11 ° 9 ′ 3.7 ″  E