Today the goal was to investigate a couple of key transects from viewsheds along itinerary 1b: the view from the Prince’s Bridge to the Double Bridge and from the Mausoleum back to the new Schloss. Having analyzed the composition of the views and the pacing of the forest from one view to the next along the path, I was curious how the topography and distance affected these views.

From the Prince’s Bridge to the Double Bridge, the transect's view had only mild topographical change, from the steep hill and valley the Prince’s Bridge spans (allowing carriages to comfortably move across ridges into or out of a forest) to a flat meadow bordered on one side by a forested ridge and the river with planted oak forest on the other. The forested slope on one side enclosed the space very nicely and the topographical asymmetry juxtaposed the overall spatial symmetry of the meadow.

The topography from the Mausoleum to Schloss transect encompassed a series of steep slopes almost acting as several large terraces supporting vast meadows, the lowest being completely obscured from the view from the Mausoleum. What is interesting about this transect (and I'm sure this applies to other viewsheds) is that it is never fully observable unless one is standing at the new Schloss as the slopes always obscure some part of the landscape when looking back toward the castle. It's a wonderful topographical trick he employs, for only the resident or visitor to the Schloss can survey the whole vastness. Additionally, when actually moving through the park, it doesn't feel like one large space that is taken in all at once, but rather several novel spatial experiences.