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24-576: The Belchen, with its furrowed, unbroken rock faces, rises 1,000 metres out of the Münstertal valley. Its north face is thus the area of highest relief energy in the German Central Uplands . Even towards the south the mountain drops steeply, its schrofen slopes descending 800 metres into the valley bowl of the Little Wiese near Neuenweg . The large expanse of rolling plateau in

48-563: A chair lift from Obermünstertal to the summit failed. Ski slopes are limited although there are now eleven ski lifts in the Belchen region. The Belchen road was the public road with the highest destination in the German Central Uplands . The uppermost section has been placed out of bounds since the opening of the cable car in December 2001. Belchen lies on the West Way , a 285-km footpath maintained by

72-437: A regular grid", is essentially an indication of the ruggedness or relative height of the terrain. Geomorphology is in large part the study of the formation of terrain or topography. Terrain is formed by concurrent processes operating on the underlying geological structures over geological time : Tectonic processes such as orogenies and uplifts cause land to be elevated, whereas erosional and weathering processes wear

96-569: A terrain or curvatures at each location. These measures can also be used to derive hydrological parameters that reflect flow/erosion processes. Climatic parameters are based on the modelling of solar radiation or air flow. Land surface objects, or landforms , are definite physical objects (lines, points, areas) that differ from the surrounding objects. The most typical examples airlines of watersheds , stream patterns, ridges , break-lines , pools or borders of specific landforms. A digital elevation model (DEM) or digital surface model (DSM)

120-641: Is a 3D computer graphics representation of elevation data to represent terrain or overlaying objects, commonly of a planet , moon , or asteroid . A "global DEM" refers to a discrete global grid . DEMs are used often in geographic information systems (GIS), and are the most common basis for digitally produced relief maps . A digital terrain model (DTM) represents specifically the ground surface while DEM and DSM may represent tree top canopy or building roofs. [REDACTED] The dictionary definition of terrain at Wiktionary Central Uplands The Central Uplands ( German : die Mittelgebirge )

144-420: Is critical for many reasons: Relief (or local relief ) refers specifically to the quantitative measurement of vertical elevation change in a landscape . It is the difference between maximum and minimum elevations within a given area, usually of limited extent. A relief can be described qualitatively, such as a " low relief " or " high relief " plain or upland . The relief of a landscape can change with

168-704: Is one of the three major natural regions of Germany . It stretches east to west across the country. To the north lies the North German Plain or Northern Lowland ; to the south, the Alps and the Alpine Foreland . The German Central Uplands, like the Scandinavian and British mountain ranges and the Urals , belong to the oldest mountains of Europe, even if their present-day appearance has only developed relatively recently. In

192-475: Is the dimension and shape of a given surface of land . In physical geography , terrain is the lay of the land. This is usually expressed in terms of the elevation , slope , and orientation of terrain features. Terrain affects surface water flow and distribution. Over a large area, it can affect weather and climate patterns. Bathymetry is the study of underwater relief, while hypsometry studies terrain relative to sea level . The understanding of terrain

216-503: The Black Forest Club that runs from Pforzheim to Basel . Other marked footpaths run from Untermünstertal, Schönau and Neuenweg up the mountain. In 2008, in order to protect the conservation area for visitor management and as a development concept, the so-called Belchen concept was developed and submitted as a model. It formulated aims, recommendations and spheres of action, not just for institutions and authorities, but also for

240-558: The Carboniferous , i.e. about 350 million years ago, Variscan mountain ranges were formed in central Europe by the uplifting caused by tectonic plate collision. Immediately after their formation the erosion of the mountains began under the influence of exogenous processes during the Permian period. During the Triassic period, which began about 225 million years ago, what is now central Europe

264-779: The Harz ), or downfaulted (trough faults or graben such as the Upper Rhine Valley ) or thrust over one another (tilted fault blocks such as the Ore Mountains ). Thus the German Central Uplands exhibit the widest variety of forms, something that is also attributable to the erosion of sediments from the Mesozoic ( Triassic , Jurassic and Cretaceous ). In some ranges the sediments have been relatively well-preserved, in others they have been carried away completely. The determining factor

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288-509: The Alps. These include the Swiss bellflower , Alpine rose , Swiss hawkbit and lichens . Belchen is a popular destination in the southern Black Forest, with over 300,000 visitors annually. In 1866 the first guest house was built below the summit. In 1899 its replacement was finished. This has been expanded and remodelled several times. In 1904 the road to Belchen was opened. In 1949 the proposal to build

312-632: The Belchen. These mark the old border between the Habsburg territory of Further Austria to the north and the Margraviate of Baden to the south of the mountain. The domed, treeless summit has a striking profile that, seen from the Upper Rhine Plain , is almost symmetrical. Belchen (Celtic: the radiant ) is a name also used for other high points in the neighbouring mountains, including two that are especially striking when covered with snow. Together with

336-562: The Belchenhaus. A gondola lift operates on Belchen with 8-person cabins that run from the bottom station in Aitern -Multen (GVV Schönau) to the top station at 1,356 metres above sea level. It is 1,150 metres long and ascends 262 metres. The Belchenbahn has disabled boarding and alighting facilities at the top and bottom stations. Relief energy Terrain (from Latin : terra 'earth'), alternatively relief or topographical relief ,

360-737: The Black Forest Belchen, they form the so-called Belchen triangle : to the west on the French side of the Upper Rhine Plain is the Alsatian Belchen ( Elsässer Belchen ) or Ballon d'Alsace in the Vosges ; to the south on the southern side of the Upper Rhine is the " Swiss Belchen ", known as Belchenflue . Also visible from Alsace are Great Belchen ( Großer ) and Little Belchen ( Kleiner Belchen ), or Grand and Petit Ballon which, together with

384-606: The beginning of the Cenozoic era, some 70 million years ago, the process of erosion of the Hercynian mountain ranges changed. During the Tertiary , alpidic mountain building took place, in the course of which strong forces deformed the stumps of the Hercynian mountains. As these rocks were already folded, further tension led to cracks and fractures, which in turn created fault blocks . These blocks were later uplifted (forming horsts such as

408-573: The eastern Black Forest has only survived in small places at the Belchen. Towards the Rhine Plain and the Blauen mountain the western main crest of the southern Black Forest has been cut into narrow ridges as a result of the marked uplift of the range during the Pleistocene and the erosive work of its streams. The ice age glaciation of the Belchen region did not leave traces as clear as those on Feldberg. To

432-431: The land away by smoothing and reducing topographic features. The relationship of erosion and tectonics rarely (if ever) reaches equilibrium. These processes are also codependent, however the full range of their interactions is still a topic of debate. Land surface parameters are quantitative measures of various morphometric properties of a surface. The most common examples are used to derive slope or aspect of

456-755: The local population and guests. Participants included the Forestry Test and Research Centre for Baden-Württemberg in Freiburg , the German Sport University , Cologne, the Southern Black Forest Nature Park, the municipality of Münstertal, the Münstertal-Staufen Holiday Region and private citizens of Münstertal. The Belchen summit circular trail is one of nine themed trails. The circular path is 1.3 km long and starts at

480-462: The north and south, small avalanche bowl glaciers formed, whose maximum extent reached the edge of the Black Forest. The domed kuppe consists of granite , whereas the surrounding mountainsides are mostly formed of gneisses . The area around Belchen was a mining region, at times an important one, between 900 and 1975. A chain of well-preserved boundary stones from 1790 runs over the summit of

504-618: The others belong to the so-called Belchen system . The panorama from the top covers large parts of the Black Forest to the Hornisgrinde , the Vosges , the Jura and, in good weather, the Alps from the Zugspitze to Mont Blanc . Belchen also has far-reaching views across the Upper Rhine Plain to Alsace. Because of its rare flora and fauna, Belchen was declared a nature reserve in 1949. The area

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528-458: The size of the area over which it is measured, making the definition of the scale over which it is measured very important. Because it is related to the slope of surfaces within the area of interest and to the gradient of any streams present, the relief of a landscape is a useful metric in the study of the Earth's surface. Relief energy, which may be defined inter alia as "the maximum height range in

552-508: Was extended to 1600 hectares in 1993, and is now part of the Southern Black Forest Nature Park . Many species of rare butterflies, beetles, and birds are found in the highland areas of Belchen. Typical birds include the raven, song thrush, citril finch and water pipit , as well as peregrine falcons , capercaillie , and hazel grouse . Among the plants are relicts from the last ice age that are otherwise only found in

576-531: Was sometimes above and sometimes below sea level. As a result, there are various layers of sedimentary rock in the Central Uplands: in most cases new red sandstone has been laid down as the terrestrial layer of rock and keuper and muschelkalk as marine sedimentary layers. The Jurassic period primarily saw the formation of limestone , whilst chalk was the main deposition from the Cretaceous period. With

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