Rappenlochschlucht
The Rappenloch Gorge is an approx. 500 m long gorge in Dornbirn in the Austrian state of Vorarlberg . It is accessed by hiking trails and footbridges and can thus be completely traversed.
Location and surroundings
The gorge is located about five kilometers southeast of the center of Dornbirn at the entrance to the Walser settlement Ebnit and at the foot of Karren and Staufen.
Coming from Dornbirn and the north alpine Flysch , the gorge leads upstream through the first solid rock massif in the Alps. Its entrance is a little above the old industrial settlement Gütle with the Rolls-Royce Museum and the now disused, formerly tallest fountain in Europe, which was built in 1869 and fed with excess water from the penstock.
It runs along the Dornbirner Ach under the former Rappenlochbrücke and ends at the Rappenlochschluchtsperre that dams the Staufensee .
The Ebensand hydropower plant , built in 1891, is located on Lake Staufensee . The Alploch Gorge begins immediately behind it .
The impressive backdrop of the gorge is also used again and again for various events and art activities. An action by the artist Martin E. Greil from Dornbirn, who had a wire sculpture in the form of a giant penis set up at the entrance to the gorge, caused a particular stir .
Origin of name
The name derivation is unclear. Possibly the name goes back to ravens or the bald ibis , an ibis species that became extinct in the Alpine regions in the late Middle Ages and that had its last colonies in such narrow rocky gorges.
history
In the Cretaceous period , around 100 to 130 million years ago, numerous layers of marl and limestone formed at the site of today's gorge . The gorge was created at the end of the Würm glacial period almost 12,000 years ago when a forerunner of the Ebniter and Dornbirner Ache broke through the limestone marl mountains of the Bregenzerwald Mountains .
In 1791 the first bridge over the gorge was built as a vaulted wooden bridge (Rappenlochbrücke). In 1845 the bridge fell victim to a fire. It was replaced by a roofed new building, also made of wood.
In 1829 the Rappenloch gorge dam, planned by Franz Alois Negrelli during his time as Vorarlberger Kreiswasserbauadjunkt. It is one of the oldest vaulted arch barriers in Vorarlberg, was raised in 1862 and expanded between 1989 and 1991.
In 1891 the Ebensand power plant was built on the Staufensee. A second turbine house was built in Gütle itself, the turbines of which were powered by water from a riveted pressure pipe that was led directly through the Rappenloch Gorge. Since this pressure pipeline had to be inspected and maintained, the first footbridges and climbs were created through the gorge. Above all, the textile manufacturer Franz Martin Hämmerle , the owner of the spinning mill of the same name in Gütle, which is now closed, did a lot for the expansion of the gorge paths.
In 1902 the general public was able to visit the gorge and has been a popular destination ever since.
The wooden Rappenlochbrücke was replaced in 1950 by a new stone arch bridge about 30 meters long.
The Alpine floods in 2005 also caused damage in the Rappenloch Gorge. Up to 246 m³ of water per second flowed through the gorge, destroying a smaller bridge.
Rock fall 2011 and two-year suspension
On May 10, 2011 at 12:48 p.m. there was a huge rock fall, which also tore the Rappenloch Bridge down with it. About 15,000 m³ of rock fell into the gorge. At the time of the collapse, there were neither vehicles nor people on the bridge or below the rock fall mass in the gorge.
After the rock fall, the paths in the gorge were on the one hand buried and on the other hand they were officially closed due to the risk of falling rocks. Initially, the reopening of the path was planned for the spring of 2013 with a new bridge construction at a higher point. The Dornbirn city council decided on October 3, 2012 the detailed planning and tender for a corresponding footbridge.
The new path and footbridge in the Rappenloch Gorge was finally built in two stages. The first part of the trail was opened in summer 2013. Since August 24, 2013, the entire path and the jetty have been freely accessible. The new footbridge leads hikers past a canyon wall, continues above the rock fall, floating almost freely and then led through below the new canyon bridge until it was removed in 2020. As the new highlight of the path, it offers a direct view of the spectacular rock fall.
Instead of the collapsed bridge, a military D-bridge was built as a temporary bridge and completed on June 16, 2011. The Rappenlochbrücke has been part of the Ebniterstraße since 1955 and has been the main connection from Dornbirn to the mountain village of Ebnit and as such has been very busy. It was initially planned that the provisional Rappenlochbrücke would be replaced by a new building.
Rock fall 2020 and bridge barrier
On the night of Thursday, March 19, 2020, around 10,000 cubic meters of rock loosened below the temporary bridge. The hiking trails were then immediately closed and the clearing of the stream bed in the Rappenloch Gorge was suspended. Three days before the second rock fall, the Austria-wide restrictions on going out and business opening in the wake of the COVID-19 pandemic came into force, which is why hiking trails and roads were significantly less frequented than usual at this time. The bridge remained in place because its abutment, which was attached above the break-off point, was anchored deep in the rock, but was closed as a precautionary measure, as the rock was undermined and unstable by the rock eruption. In order to avoid its loss , pioneers of the armed forces supported by a truck crane company and the Dornbirn road maintenance department dismantled the bridge on March 25, 2020 as a precaution.
For the journey from Dornbirn to the mountain parcel Ebnit, the bypass road via the Kehlegg district was opened. Subsequently, the construction road on the east bank of the Staufensee was expanded in the following days so that it can serve as a shorter connection. The main connecting road into Ebnit via Ebniterstraße now leads down to Staufensee shortly before the former Rappenlochbrücke, with a bridge over a narrow part of the lake and then leads back up to the original road on the other side of the valley.
Web links
Coordinates: 47 ° 23 ′ 0 ″ N , 9 ° 46 ′ 45 ″ E
Individual evidence
- ↑ a b R. Oberhauser (Ed.): The geological structure of Austria . Springer, Vienna 1980, ISBN 978-3-7091-3744-4 . , quoted from M. Walter; U. Schwaderer; M. Joswig: Seismic monitoring of precursory fracture signals from a destructive rockfall in the Vorarlberg Alps, Austria . In: Natural Hazards and Earth System Sciences . No. 12 . Stuttgart November 29, 2012 (English, copernicus.org [PDF]).
- ^ Rappenloch Dornbirn: History. Retrieved August 24, 2020 .
- ^ Rappenloch Dornbirn: Geology. Retrieved August 24, 2020 .
- ↑ a b c d M. Walter; U. Schwaderer; M. Joswig: Seismic monitoring of precursory fracture signals from a destructive rockfall in the Vorarlberg Alps, Austria . In: Natural Hazards and Earth System Sciences . No. 12 . Stuttgart November 29, 2012 (English, copernicus.org [PDF]).
- ↑ a b Lexicon Dornbirn - Rappenlochbrücke. Retrieved August 24, 2020 .
- ↑ Rappenlochschlucht: Footbridge instead of tunnel Article on vorarlberg.orf.at from October 3, 2012.
- ↑ Rappenloch Gorge freely accessible ( memento of the original from May 21, 2014 in the Internet Archive ) Info: The archive link was automatically inserted and not yet checked. Please check the original and archive link according to the instructions and then remove this notice. : Karren Dornbirn Online. Article dated August 22, 2013 (accessed October 29, 2013)
- ↑ Rappenloch in Dornbirn: Renovation work starts Article on vol.at of September 8, 2019.
- ↑ a b Another rock fall in the Rappenloch Gorge. In: vorarlberg.ORF.at . March 19, 2020, accessed March 19, 2020 .
- ↑ BMLVS Communication Department - Section 3: Dismantling the Pioneer Bridge to Ebnit. Retrieved June 28, 2020 .
- ↑ Rappenlochbrücke is history. In: Vorarlberger Nachrichten (VN.at). March 26, 2020, accessed June 28, 2020 .
