Wechsel Pass

F1

The changing area of 10,000 meters

The change is a low mountain range in the east of Austria with the high AC ( 1743 m above sea level. A. ) as the main peak and two other peaks over 1,700 meters. The mountain range is about 15 km, the boundary of the provinces of Lower Austria and Styria southeast of Semmering and northeast of Graz Bay, between the Feistritzsattel and the same Wechsel Pass.

Geography

The high change with the weather Kogler House

The change is part of the Edge Mountains east of the Mur. He is - apart from the half as high Wienerwald - the easternmost mountain range of the Alps. Its highest point is 1743 m above sea level. A. Hochwechsel, formerly called High Umschuss, on top of which stands the weather Kogler house of the Austrian Alpine Club. From there, the ridge extends northwest to Umschußriegel (1720 m above sea level. A. ) and further to Schöberlriegel (1704 m above sea level. A. ) and east to the low exchange ( 1669m above sea level. A. ).

The change is considered to be the boundary between the Styrian Joglland and the Hunchback world, which extends to the extreme southeast of Lower Austria by the Vienna Basin. To the east, these landscapes go Pinkatal, over in the Günser mountains and the Pannonian Plain.

Important places at the foot of the bill, which benefit from the mountain as a tourist communities, are Aspangbahn, Aspangberg -St. Peter, Dechantskirchen, Feistritz am Wechsel, Friedberg, Kirchberg am Wechsel, Mönichkirchen, Mönichwald, Pinggau, Trattenbach, Sankt Corona am Wechsel, Sankt Jakob im Walde, Vorau, Forest Brook and Little cell.

The mountain group breakdown by Trimmel defines the change ( part of Group No. 2852 ):

• In the southeast at Rohrbach an der Lafnitz ( 455 m) Pinka up - Pinggau - Change Pass ( 980 m) - Mönichkirchen - Large Piestingbach to Aspangbahn to the area between Lafnitz and Pinka ( 2821; western part of Southern Burgenland 2820 )
• In the north- east and north from Aspangbahn Piestingbach down to the confluence with the ( Lower Austria ) Feistritzbach ( for Pitten, when Wanghof, 437 m) - these upward to Kirchberg aW - Otterbach - Otterthal against the hunchback World ( 2870 )
• In the north- west at Otterthal Trattenbach up to priests against the Semmering region ( 2860/östlich the Semmering Pass in 2862 )
• In the northwest continue with priests to Feistritzsattel ( 1298 m) - White Feistritzwerke / ( Styrian ) Feistritzbach down to Rettenegg to Pretulalpe - Stuhleck ( 2843, Eastern Fischbacher Alps)
• In the southwest from Rettenegg Feistritzwerke ( bach ) down to Wh Knoll Mill / bridge 701 m (municipality Falkenstein ) - Höllgraben left up - pass at Eben -quarters ( 982 m) - Forest Brook - Lafnitz - Mönichwald - Rohrbach Rabenwald - Masenberg ( 2851 )

After the Alpine Club classification of the Eastern Alps (AVE ) in exchange for Edge Mountains east part of the Mur (No. 47), according to Trimmel to the subgroup changes and Jogelland the main group Cetische Alps and oststeirisch - Burgenland hills (No. 2800).

Geology

From a geological perspective, the exchange area a carapace region of the outgoing to the east Austrian Central Alps dar. This is a dome-shaped bulge of the Alpine underground, from the fall, the higher ceiling of the " core series" of coarse gneiss to the west, north and south. Because of the difficult to be interpreted tectonic mapping among geologists is not uniform. Most include the change to the Austroalpine, Penninic for some.

The stock of rocks was referred to 1970 mainly as an alternating shale and alternating gneiss. Among the carbonates of the Triassic ( like in neighboring Semmering system of limestone, dolomite and roughness Wacken exist ) and various quartzites and quartz conglomerates is a so-called Arkoseschiefer breccia Porphyroid series ( abbreviated ABP- series: In recent decades, the storage conditions were explored in more detail ), which corresponds to the Alpine Verrucano of Alexander Tollmann. A typical ABP mineral is the phengite, a product of the metamorphosis at low temperature, but a high rock pressure.

The "hang the alternating shale " consist partly made up of thin phyllite with epidote - chlorite - albite, quartz and scattered volcanic ashes. The " change of shale lying " show some graphite and increasing metamorphism, so that sedimentary structures disappear and the phyllite in mica schist passes ( with muscovite ).

Down the exchange shale lying goes on in exchange gneiss whose Hauptgemengteile are now albite, quartz, muscovite and chlorite. In Storage is also found greenschist, at the edge also jammed Mesozoic, set wrinkles and wedges.

To the northwest, the change from rocks dip below that of the Semmering system, west to Stuhleck -crystallin of Pretul blanket the interface, however, is steep. In part, this ceiling limit has been detected by recent faulting and southward again more complicated. On the eastern edge of the switch panel that redrew the powerful fault line Aspangbahn -Friedberg is difficult. You could not be fully clarified by the tunnel of change path.

In summary it can be stated that in exchange windows comes a deeper unity than the Semmering system. In some places even shows a dachformiges clashing of alternating coarse gneiss and gneiss. The Austroalpine units of the exchange area are likely to be (ie, before the formation of mountains ) located in front of the alpidischen narrowing of about 30-40 km south and partly from the Variscan time.

Tourism

In summer, the exchange is a popular hiking area in the recreation room of Vienna. In addition to the weather Kogler house, there are other, sometimes only seasonally inhabited and huts in the exchange: the Mariensee Schwaig, Steyersberger Schwaig, Kamp Steiner Schwaig (which burned down in the summer of 2004, of unknown causes down to the ground and was built completely again), Crane Berger Schwaig, Feistritzer Schwaig and Vorauer of Munich. The Thal Schwaig is inhabited, but no longer farmed, for mountaineers.

For the winter season, there is on the slopes of the change several small ski areas:

• In Lower Austria: Mönichkirchen - Mariensee, Trattenbach, Sankt Corona am Wechsel and Arabichl in Kirchberg am Wechsel
• In Styria: Mönichwald, Sankt Jakob im Walde and little cell

The region is due to the Austroalpine situation not particularly snowy, which is not due to the temperatures, but the low rainfall.

In winter also covers the exchange field, the Wechsel-Semmering Panorama Trail. Access points Greis, grief farmer barn, Dissauer, Feistritzsattel, Steyersberger Schwaig, Sankt Corona am Wechsel and Mariensee are interconnected via a 100 km long network of trails between 1000 and 1500 m above sea level.

The floor of the exchange offers good conditions for simple and also almost always safe from avalanches backcountry skiing and snowshoeing. A popular ascent leads, for example, of Mariensee on the Mariensee Schwaig from the northeast to the summit of high change. On the treeless and exposed windward ridges, however, is even in midwinter often very little snow.

Transport infrastructure

From Styria from the exchange with the car is to drive for a fee, by the Lower Austrian side it is for tourists only accessible on foot.

The exchange leads next to the Semmering Pass, the main traffic artery between the two provinces of Lower Austria and Styria. It is crossed by the change of road B 54, which in the 1980s was the most important traffic connection between Vienna and Graz to the expansion of the southern motorway A 2. This national highway is today referred to as scenic road, indicating the beautiful vantage points along the road.

The changing over crossing railway line change train never reached the importance of competing Semmering Railway, but is the only rail link from Lower Austria in Eastern Styria and southern Burgenland; they used for freight as an alternative route of the Semmering Railway, is for regional passenger but only of minor importance.

At the southeastern foothills of the change of Irrbühels ( about a meter track width ) were erroneously marked as a Roman road west out of the rock ground vehicle tracks. According to research by historian Krawarik but is grinding marks of the goods traffic, which took place in the 18th and 19th century to supply the glassworks in Schaueregg with quartz boulders.