10 largest cities in Germany
Berlin
Hamburg
Munich
Cologne
Frankfurt am Main
Hanover
Dusseldorf
Leipzig
Bremen
Dresden
Augsburg (in the Swabian local dialect Augschburg, Latin Augusta
Vindelicorum and Augusta Vindelicum) is an independent city in
southwest Bavaria and one of the three Bavarian metropolises. It is
a university town and seat of the government of the Swabian district
as well as the district office of the Augsburg district in the west
surrounding the city.
The city became a major city in 1909
and, with over 300,000 inhabitants, is the third largest city in
Bavaria after Munich and Nuremberg. The Augsburg conurbation also
ranks third in terms of population and economic strength in Bavaria
and is part of the Augsburg planning region, in which around 885,000
people live. In 2017, Augsburg had the second-lowest rate of all
criminal offenses among German cities with over 200,000 inhabitants.
The name of the city, which is one of the oldest in Germany,
goes back to 15 BC. Roman army camp founded in BC and the later
Roman provincial capital Augusta Vindelicum. In the 13th century,
the city broke away from episcopal rule, became an imperial city by
1316 at the latest and was often the scene of diets with close ties
to the rulers of the Holy Roman Empire, which were financed by the
Welser and Fugger merchant families ("Fuggerstadt"). After the
Reformation, Augsburg, in which the Augsburg Religious Peace was
concluded in 1555, became biconfessional.
The city is the
only German city with a public holiday that is limited to the urban
area, the Augsburg High Peace Festival, which is celebrated every
year on August 8th. This makes Augsburg the city with the largest
number of public holidays in Germany.
geography
The city lies on the rivers Lech, Wertach and
Singold. The oldest part of the city as well as the southern
quarters are located on the northern foothills of a high terrace
that arose between the steep hillside of Friedberg in the east and
the high Riedeln on the western edge of the hill.
In the
south extends the Lechfeld, a post-glacial gravel plain between the
two large rivers Lech and Wertach, in which rare primeval landscapes
have been preserved. The Augsburg city forest and the Lechtalheiden
are among the most species-rich Central European habitats.
Augsburg borders the Augsburg - Western Forests nature park, a large
forest area. In addition, the urban area itself is heavily greened,
which is why the city was the first German city to be recognized as
the greenest and most livable city in the European competition
Entente Florale Europe in 1997. The city is the largest communal
forest owner in Bavaria and the third largest in Germany.
Neighboring communities
The city is surrounded in the east by the
district of Aichach-Friedberg and in the west by the district of
Augsburg. Due to the elongated city area in north-south direction,
many cities and municipalities border on Augsburger Flur.
The
agglomeration is formed by Friedberg (district of
Aichach-Friedberg), Königsbrunn, Stadtbergen, Neusäß and Gersthofen
(all district of Augsburg), starting in the east and following
clockwise, all of which with their settlement core border directly
on the built-up area of Augsburg.
In addition, the
municipalities of Rehling, Affing, Kissing, Mering and Merching (all
districts of Aichach-Friedberg) as well as Bobingen, Gessertshausen
and Diedorf (all districts of Augsburg) border the city (clockwise
from the north).
City structure
The urban area consists of
42 urban districts, which form 17 planning areas. This type of urban
structure has existed since 1938. The total area is 147 square
kilometers (39th place among German cities).
The districts
are partly formerly independent communities, partly newly
established residential areas. Some districts have spatially
separated settlements (residential areas) with their own names.
Districts not mentioned in the administrative structure are the
Augsburg old town as part of the inner city and the Augsburg textile
district, which is partly in Spickel-Herrenbach, partly in the inner
city.
The former barracks and residential areas of the US
Army kept their names after the troop withdrawal in 1998, including
Centerville, Cramerton, Reese, Sheridan, Sullivan Heights and
Supply-Center. Many of these barracks are now residential areas.
Waters
The city lies on three rivers: the Lech is the largest
flowing body of water and is widened by the tributary of the
Wertach, which flows north of the Wolfzahnau nature reserve. The
third Augsburg river, the Singold, has its source in the Ostallgäu
and flows into the widely ramified artificial stream and canal
system in the city. The numerous canals in Augsburg - most of them
flow through the Lechviertel in the old town - are spanned by 500
bridge structures. They are part of the site “The Augsburg Water
Management System”, which was added to the UNESCO World Heritage
List on July 6, 2019.
The factory canal into which the
Singold flows is derived from the Wertach in Göggingen, flows north
as the Wertach Canal, Holzbach or Senkelbach and returns to the
Wertach after the Augsburg balloon factory.
At the
Hochablass, the Hauptstadtbach and the Neubach are diverted from the
Lech, which merge again after a few hundred meters, to briefly flow
downstream into the Herrenbach, which flows north (downstream
Proviantbach with its outflows and feeders, Hanreibach and
Fichtelbach) and the Kaufbach, which flows west forks. The Kaufbach
feeds the Schäfflerbach and the city ditches and inner city canals,
which flow together again to the north on the grounds of the
UPM-Kymmene and as a city stream in the western area of the
Wolfzahnau flow again with the Proviantbach to reach the Lech a few
meters before the Wertach confluence . The Mühlbach flows through
the Pfersee district.
The Brunnenbach, the Reichskanal and
the Lochbach (a Lechkanal) flow through the city forest. They branch
out into other small streams to unite again shortly before the inner
city.
The Kuhsee and the smaller Stempflesee are located in
the alluvial forest that the Lech flows through. In the north of
Augsburg there are the Autobahnsee, the Kaisersee and the
Europaweiher at the Augsburg Garbage Hill. The Wertach reservoir,
the Lautersee and the Ilsesee (local recreation area) are located in
the south of Augsburg.
The nature reserves in the south of
Augsburg serve the Augsburg drinking water supply. The city forest
and the Lechau forest near Unterbergen are therefore designated as
drinking water protection areas. The water drawn from there with a
degree of hardness of 13.5 ° dH (medium hard) supplies the cities of
Augsburg, Neusäß, Friedberg and Stadtbergen.
nature and environment
After the large-scale incorporations of
the 1970s, the city is one of the greenest cities in Germany with
around a third of green and forest areas.
The Augsburg city
forest - with about 21.5 square kilometers the largest Bavarian
alluvial forest - forms a closed forest area in the southeast and is
of high regional importance for nature conservation and as a local
recreation and leisure area. There are seven landscape protection,
four FFH and two nature protection areas in the urban area (as of
May 2016).
The south-west of the city is covered by parts of
the Augsburg-Westliche Wälder nature park. This 1,175 square
kilometer nature park is the only one in Bavarian Swabia. It is
bounded in the north by the Danube, in the east by the slopes of the
Wertach and Schmutter and in the west by the Mindel. In the south it
extends to the edge of the Unterallgäu.
The city is
nationwide as a model city for environmentally friendly lighting.
Measures against light pollution in the area of public lighting
have reduced electricity consumption and thus carbon dioxide
emissions by 20 percent, which leads to annual savings of 250,000
euros.
In a study by the Geers Foundation in 2011, Augsburg
had the second best value of German cities with over 250,000
inhabitants after Münster - only 17.0 percent of the city area was
exposed to a daily average of more than 55 decibels.
In
November 2013, Augsburg was awarded the German Sustainability Prize
as the “most sustainable city in 2013”.
climate
The city
lies in the transition between the humid Atlantic and the dry
continental climate on the Lechfeld plain in a slight valley
location. Other weather-determining factors are the Alps as a
Central European and the Danube as a regional weather divide.
Therefore the weather is relatively changeable. Over the past six
decades, Augsburg has seen an increase in temperature, a decrease in
precipitation and an increase in the occurrence of extreme values.
The weather periods vary between moderate, not too cold winters
and warm, not excessively hot summers. Large amounts of snow, which
protect the vegetation during periods of frost, usually do not fall
until January and last until mid-March. Larger amounts of
precipitation are recorded in early summer, mostly from westerly
winds. Longer dry periods occur in midsummer and early autumn.
The foehn brings warm and dry air currents from the south into
the lower Alpine foothills to Augsburg all year round. Associated
with this is good visibility, so that the Bavarian and Allgäu Alps
can often be clearly seen.
The average annual temperature is
around 8.4 degrees Celsius, and the annual rainfall is around 850
millimeters. During the hot summer of 2003, a temperature of 36.0
degrees was measured on August 13, the absolute maximum value since
the beginning of temperature observations is 37.1 degrees on July
27, 1983. The lowest registered temperature was -28.2 degrees,
measured on February 12, 1929.
Due to its location in the
most thunderstorm-intensive state of Bavaria, Augsburg is often
affected by violent storms, which lead to enormous Lech and Wertach
floods. This had the greatest impact in 1999 when a weir broke on
the Wertach and entire parts of the city were flooded.
On
autumn days it is often foggy in Augsburg because of its location in
the valley of the Lech. After Munich, Augsburg is the snowiest city
in Germany.