Landwehrplatz in Immenstadt is significant not only for the Alpzug sculptures, but also for the babbling Steigbach stream.
Alpzug
The group of bronze cow sculptures on the Steigbach headstone is meant to remind us of the annual driving up and down of the cattle herds through Immenstadt’s Steigbach valley, where the herdsmen celebrated the traditional festive end of a long mountain summer on the Alps. The sculpture of the Alpine procession was created by Bonifatius Stirnberg of Aachen on behalf of the town, and was then erected in April 2000.
Steigbach
The Steigbach not only served as a power supply for the town of Immenstadt, but also for the Kaiserbrauerei, which used the water for its brewery. Nowadays, electricity is still generated from the power of the water.
In the summer of 1873, a tragic flood occurred in Immenstadt. Due to many days of rain, the water in the Steigbach valley dammed up and as a consequence, the Steigbach swelled – the rain became like a wall. The small stream turned into a flood that rushed towards the town, ripping away everything in its wake. Even the twine factory weir could not withstand the sheer masses of water. On Marienplatz, the Mariensäule fell victim to the flood. Eleven people lost their lives to the waters.
In around 1875, the Steigbach was finally dyked and corrected. The torrent damming was the first in the whole of Bavaria, and the gradient of the Steigbach also gave rise to the first advanced high-pressure water pipeline at the mechanical twine factory, which used the Steigbach for energy.