Guber quarry

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The quarry Guber is a quarry of quartz sandstone in the town of Alpnach in the Obwalden in Switzerland . The rock is light to dark gray in color and is often crossed by white calcite veins. The quarry is one of the largest quarries in Switzerland, it has been mined there since 1904. The name Guber comes from the Gallic word kuvro , which means rubble or rubble .

history

The quartz sandstone in the Guber quarry was created around 60 million years ago. The quarry was founded in 1904 by Giovanni Toneatti and Jacques Hösli. Toneatti had discovered the quality of Guberstein, a test for compressive strength and weather resistance by the Federal Materials Testing and Research Institute gave good results.

Until 1926 there was only a cable car down to Steinweid for the removal of the paving stones , from there the stones were transported by horse and cart to Alpnach train station. From 1926, a 3.7 kilometer long funicular from the Guber to the loading station at Alpnach Dorf station could be used. It was a winch train. The drive with the winch was installed in a small building next to the mountain station on terrace I. There were intermediate stops at Terraces II and III. The valley station was on terrace IV next to the loading station for the cable car towards Alpnach Dorf. This funicular was destroyed by a landslide in 1930 and immediately rebuilt.

Up to 200 people worked in the Guber, many of them guest workers from Italy . In the record year of 1929, 25,000 tons of stone were extracted. During the Second World War , the demand fell more and more, only 80 to 90 people worked in the Guber. After the war, Italian workers came back to the Guber, mostly from the Udine region . At the beginning of the 1970s, 100 to 120 people worked in the Guber. Due to the recession and the competition for cheap paving stones from abroad, job cuts were necessary, so that in 1978 there were only 30 employees. In 1986 operations were stopped.

In 1987, today's Guber Natursteine ​​AG was founded. Since then, the company has been maintained mainly with workers from Portugal . In 1988 the Guberbahn was demolished, and since then it has been transported by truck.

The stone

The stone is composed of 75% limestone , 18% quartz , 5% feldspar and 2% other minerals. The quartz sandstone is particularly hard. Due to the high quartz content, it has good resistance and natural abrasion . It has low water absorption , high compressive strength and is easy to split. These properties make it well suited as a building material.

Dismantling and use

The quarry is operated by Guber Natursteine ​​AG. In 2004, it employed around 40 people and during this time it mined around 25,000 to 35,000 tons of natural stone per year . Around 7,000 tons of this were processed into paving stones. In 2013 the annual production was 60,000 tons. In 2019 the company employed 57 people and produces around 12,000 tons of paving stones annually.

For further processing, the stones are split, sawed and also flamed. Despite modern machines, a substantial part of the work is still done by hand. The finished product is used indoors and outdoors, as paving stones, flamed slabs and polished slabs.

A special feature of the company is the processing of paving stones with a surface tolerance of a maximum of three millimeters. As a result, a handicapped accessible paving can be created with the stones . The company has developed a special machine for processing these stones.

literature

Movies

  • "Guber - Work in the Stone", 1979 documentary by Hans-Ulrich Schlumpf on the history and the tough everyday work on the "Guber", the last quarry north of the Alps in the canton of Obwalden.

Web links

Individual evidence

  1. ↑ Angelo Garovi : Obwalden story . State Archives of the Canton of Obwalden, Sarnen 2000, ISBN 3-9520429-1-9 . P. 20
  2. ↑ Alpnach Dorf Quarry Guber Terrace IV - Terrace I , information page on standseilbahnen.ch
  3. ↑ The right stone in the right place, see web links.
  4. ↑ a b Sharp cut for wheelchair users , article from Central Switzerland on Sunday June 16, 2013, p. 23.
  5. ↑ Over 1200 people went on a tour of discovery in the quarry in Alpnach. In: Obwaldner Zeitung, September 16, 2019
  6. ↑ Guber - Arbeit im Stein, 1979 information page on the website of the film author Hans-Ulrich Schlumpf
  7. ^ Quarry and Science-Fiction , Tagblatt Online, January 19, 2010

Coordinates: 46 ° 55 '40 "  N , 8 ° 14' 8.7"  E ; CH1903:  660707  /  197716