Change (mountain)

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Change (change area)
The change area from 10,000 meters above sea level

The change area from 10,000 meters above sea level

Highest peak Hochwechsel ( 1743  m above sea level )
location Lower Austria and Styria , Austria
part of Edge mountains east of the Mur ( AVE ) / Cetian Alps and the hill country of eastern Styria and Burgenland (Trimmel); Eastern Alps
Classification according to Joke 2852
Coordinates 47 ° 32 '  N , 15 ° 55'  E Coordinates: 47 ° 32 '  N , 15 ° 55'  E
Type Promontory
rock Triassic carbonates, quartzites / quartz conglomerates, arkose slate-breccia-porphyroid series (interchangeable slate, alpine verrucano)
Age of the rock Permian / Triassic (300-200 mill. A)
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The Wechsel is a low mountain range in the east of Austria with the Hochwechsel ( 1743  m above sea level ) as the main peak and two other peaks over 1700 m. The mountain range forms the border between the federal states of Lower Austria and Styria, southeast of the Semmering and northeast of the Graz Basin , between the Feistritzsattel and the Wechsel pass of the same name , for about 15 km .

geography

High change
The high change with the Wetterkogler house

The high change with the Wetterkogler house

height 1743  m above sea level A.
location Lower Austria and Styria , Austria
Dominance 10.5 km →  Stuhleck
Notch height 445 m ↓  Feistritzsattel
Coordinates 47 ° 31 ′ 50 "  N , 15 ° 54 ′ 46"  E
Wechsel (mountain) (Lower Austria)
Change (mountain)

The change is a part of the foothills east of the Mur . Apart from the Vienna Woods , which is half as high , it is the easternmost mountain range in the Alps . Its highest point is 1743  m above sea level. A. der Hochwechsel , formerly called Hoher Umschlag , on the top of which is the Wetterkoglerhaus of the Austrian Alpine Club . From there the ridge runs northwest to the Umschußriegel ( 1720  m above sea level ) and on to the Schöberlriegel ( 1704  m above sea level ) and east to the Niederwechsel ( 1669  m above sea level ).

The change is considered the border between the Styrian Joglland and the Bucklige Welt , which extends from the Vienna Basin to the extreme southeast of Lower Austria. To the east, these landscapes merge into the Pinkatal , the Günser Mountains and the Pannonian lowlands .

Important places at the foot of the Wechsel that benefit from the mountain as a tourist community are Aspang , Aspangberg-St. Peter , Dechantskirchen , Feistritz am Wechsel , Friedberg , Kirchberg am Wechsel , Mönichkirchen , Mönichwald , Pinggau , Trattenbach , Sankt Corona am Wechsel , Sankt Jakob im Walde , Sankt Lorenzen am Wechsel , Vorau , Waldbach and Wenigzell .

The "Hohe Umschuß" (bottom left) around 1873 (recording sheet of the regional survey )

The mountain group breakdown according to Trimmel delimits the change (subgroup No. 2852):

According to the Alpine Club division of the Eastern Alps (AVE), the change to the marginal mountains east of the Mur (No. 47), according to Trimmel to the sub-group Wechsel and Jogelland (No. 2850) of the main group Cetan Alps and East Styrian-Burgenland hill country (No. 2800).

geology

From a geological point of view, the Wechsel area represents a Carapace region of the Austrian Central Alps , which expire to the east . This is a dome-shaped bulge of the Alpine subsoil from which the higher ceilings of the "core series" of heavy gneiss fall to the west, north and south. Because of the difficult tectonics to interpret , the classification among geologists is not uniform. Most count the change to the Unterostalpin , some to the Penninikum .

The stock of rocks was mainly as to 1970 exchange slate and change gneiss called. In recent decades, the storage conditions have been researched in more detail: Among the carbonates of the Triassic (which, as in the neighboring Semmering system, consist of lime , dolomite and rauhwacken ) and various quartzites or quartz conglomerates, there is a so-called arkose slate - breccia - porphyroid series (abbreviated ABP series ), which corresponds to the Alpine Verrucano by Alexander Tollmann . A typical ABP mineral is phengite , a product of metamorphosis at low temperatures but high rock pressure.

The " hanging alternating schist " are partly composed of thin phyllites with epidote-chlorite-albite, quartz and interspersed volcanic ashes . The “lying alternating slate ” show some graphite and increasing metamorphosis, so that sedimentary structures disappear and the phyllite changes into mica slate (with muskowite).

At the bottom, the alternating schist changes into alternating gneiss, the main components of which are now albite , quartz, muscovite and chlorite . Greenschist is also embedded , along with the Mesozoic Era, lying folds and wedges.

To the northwest, the alternating rocks submerge below those of the Semmering system, to the west to the Stuhleck - crystalline of the Pretul ceiling, however, the boundary surface is steep. This ceiling boundary was partially covered by younger fracture tectonics and becomes even more complicated towards the south. At the eastern edge of the changing window, the demarcation of the boundary is made more difficult by the powerful Aspang-Friedberg fault line . It could not be completely clarified even through the tunnel of the alternating path.

In summary, it can be stated that a deeper unit than the Semmering system appears in the changing window. In some places there is even a roof-shaped juxtaposition of alternating gneiss and coarse gneiss. Before the Alpine narrowing (i.e. before the mountain formation), the sub-eastern Alpine units of the change area are likely to be located about 30–40 km to the south and partly date from the Variscan period .

tourism

Wetterkoglerhaus at the summit
The Feistritzer Schwaig in winter

In summer, the Wechsel is a popular hiking area in Vienna's recreational area . In addition to the Wetterkoglerhaus , there are other huts on the Wechsel, some of which are only seasonally inhabited and managed: the Marienseer Schwaig, Steyersberger Schwaig, Kampsteiner Schwaig (which burned down to its foundations in the summer of 2004 for unknown reasons and was completely rebuilt), Kranichberger Schwaig , Feistritzer Schwaig and Vorauer Schwaig . The Thalberger Schwaig is inhabited, but no longer cultivated for mountaineers.

For the winter season there are several small ski areas on the slopes of the Wechsel:

Due to its eastern alpine location, the region is not particularly snow-reliable, which is not due to the temperatures, but to the low amount of precipitation.

In winter, the Wechsel-Semmering Panorama Trail extends over the Wechsel area . The entry points Greis , Kummerbauerstadl, Dissauer, Feistritzsattel, Steyersberger Schwaig, Sankt Corona am Wechsel and Mariensee are connected by an approximately 100 km long network of trails between 1000 and 1500 m above sea level.

The Stock des Wechsel offers good conditions for easy and almost always avalanche-safe ski tours and snowshoe hikes . A popular increase leads z. B. from Mariensee over the Marienseer Schwaig from the northeast to the summit of the Hochwechsel. However, even in the middle of winter there is often very little snow on the treeless and unprotected mountain ridges.

Transport infrastructure

Historic boundary stone on the B 54

From Styria , the Wechsel can be accessed by car for a fee, from the Lower Austrian side it is only accessible for tourists on foot.

Alongside the Semmering Pass, the most important traffic axis between the two federal states of Lower Austria and Styria leads over the eastern flank of the Wechsel . It is crossed by Wechselstraße B 54, which was the most important car traffic connection between Vienna and Graz until the A 2 southern motorway was expanded in the 1980s . This former federal road, which leads over the actual Wechselpass , is now also known as a panorama road, which indicates the beautiful viewpoints along the road. The Südautobahn crosses east of the Hartberg near Schäffern , Knolln and Guggendorf .

The Wechselbahn crossing the change never achieved the importance of the Semmering line , but it is the only rail connection from Lower Austria to Eastern Styria and Southern Burgenland. It is used as an alternative to the Semmering Railway for freight traffic, but is only of secondary importance for regional passenger traffic. The maximum height is in the Hartberg tunnel .

At the south-eastern foothills of the Wechsel, to the west of the Irrbühel, vehicle tracks carved into the rock (about one meter wide) were mistakenly marked as Roman roads . According to the research of the historian Hans Krawarik, however, it is a matter of dragging marks from the truck traffic that was carried out in the 18th and 19th centuries to supply the glassworks in Schaueregg with quartz boulders. The actual Altstraße can be seen at Spital and over the Hartberg Pass.

literature

  • K. Schuster, R. Berka, E. Draganits, W. Frank & R. Schuster: lithologies, history of metamorphosis and tectonic structure of crystalline units on the eastern edge of the Alps . In: Federal Geological Institute 2001 - Neuberg an der Mürz. Contributions . 2002, p. 29–56 ( online version; PDF file; 4.6 MB ).
  • Peter Faupl: On the geology and petrography of the southern change area . In: Communications from the Geological Society in Vienna . 63rd volume. Vienna 1970, p. 22-51 ( pdf , uibk.ac.at).

Web links

Commons : Exchange  - collection of images, videos and audio files

Individual evidence

  1. see Ref .; as well as R. Oberhauser, FK Bauer: The geological structure of Austria . Springer, 1980, ISBN 3-211-81556-2 ( page 318 f. In the Google book search).
  2. Wetterkoglerhaus, 1,743 m category II , OeAV section Österr. Mountain Club
  3. Schwaig is the regional word for Alm (mountain pasture)
  4. Wechsel-Semmering-Panoramaloipe  ( page no longer available , search in web archivesInfo: The link was automatically marked as defective. Please check the link according to the instructions and then remove this notice. , ARGE Langlauf, accessed on April 24, 2012@1@ 2Template: Toter Link / www.loipeninfo.at  
  5. H. Krawarik: Newer findings on the older history of Mönichkirche. onA, 2005 ( eReader, docplayer.org , see history, moenichkirchen.at, accessed October 25, 2015).
  6. ^ Fritz Posch: To localize the Salzburg property mentioned in the document from 860. In: Mitteilungen der Gesellschaft für Salzburger Landeskunde (MGSLK) 101, 1961, p. 252 (whole article, p. 243–260).