!!!Enns, Fluss

Enns, River, southern tributary of the River Danube, main river in 
north-western Styria; its name derives from Celtic "Anisa", 
254 km long; a typical torrent of the northern part of the 
Eastern Alps, it has the fifth largest catchment area in Austria 
(6,080 km%%sup 2/%). Its average rate of flow at the measuring 
point Enns-Ortskai is 201 m%%sup 3/%/sec. The River Enns has its 
source in the Radstaedter Tauern mountains in the province of Salzburg 
and flows through a partly marshy, longitudinal valley, which was 
formed during the Ice Age, between the northern Limestone Alps and the 
Central Alps; until it meets the River Palten; at the Mandling pass it 
enters the province of Styria and cuts through the limestone massif  
Ennstal Alps, forming the narrow, 15 km long Gesaeuse valley between 
Admont and Hieflau. It then turns north and after being joined by 
Laussabach stream flows on Upper Austrian territory. North of the town 
of Steyr, in the Alpine Fore-Land, the River Enns forms the border 
between the provinces of Upper and Lower Austria, (hence the old names 
"Oesterreich ob der Enns" - i.e. above the Enns,  and "Oesterreich 
unter der Enns" - i.e. below the Enns), and flows into the River 
Danube near Mauthausen. In the middle of the 19%%sup th/%  century the 
regulation of the approximately 70 km-long stretch between 
Weissenbach bei Haus and the Gesaeuse was undertaken, the aim being to 
gain effective areas for agriculture and forestation by draining the 
valley bottoms. By 1939 the course of the river had been shortened by 
19 km. The Ennskraftwerke-AG ( Ennskraft) built 10 run-of-river power 
plants (Schoenau, Weyer, Grossraming, Losenstein, Ternberg, Rosenau, 
Garsten-St. Ulrich, Staning, Muehlrading and St. Pantaleon) in the 
lower course of the E. valley. In 1998 these 10 storage power plants 
generated a total wattage of 1.8 billion kWh. The main towns 
and villages of the E. valley are: Radstadt in the province of 
Salzburg; Schladming, Groebming, Liezen, Selzthal and Admont in 
Styria; Grossraming, Ternberg, Garsten, Steyr and Enns in Upper 
Austria. Today the Ennstal valley is a major transit road between 
Germany and Slovenia.


%%language
[Back to the Austrian Version|AEIOU/Enns,_Fluss|class='wikipage austrian']
%%

[{FreezeArticle author='AEIOU' template='Lexikon_1995_englisch'}]
[{ALLOW view All}][{ALLOW comment All}][{ALLOW edit FreezeAdmin}]