Heppenheim

Heppenheim (Bergstraße) is the seat of Bergstraße district in Hesse, Germany, lying on the Bergstraße on the edge of the Odenwald. It is best known for being the birthplace of Sebastian Vettel, a four-time Formula One World Champion. The town is set on the vineyards below the mediaeval Starkenburg (castle). Defining for the townscape, besides the castle, is St. Peter, the “Cathedral of the Bergstraße” as the big Catholic church is known locally; it was consecrated on 1 August 1904, and is not a bishop's seat. Heppenheim lies centrally on Bundesstraßen 3 and 460, and Autobahn A 5/A 67, almost halfway between Heidelberg and Darmstadt, in southern Hesse on the boundary with Baden-Württemberg, and is Hesse's southernmost district seat. The town's official designation is “Heppenheim an der Bergstraße”. In the local Palatinate German dialect, the town is also called Hepprum. “Bergstraße” is not only the name given the road running from Darmstadt to Heidelberg on the western edge of the Odenwald and eastern edge of the Rhine rift (now Bundesstraße 3), but also one given the landscape along the road. It stands out with its unusually mild and sunny climate in which trees blossom especially early. In the area around the outlying centre of Ober-Laudenbach is a boundary oddity unique in Hesse: just there within the town's municipal area are two enclaves belonging to Baden-Württemberg, within one of which is a further enclave belonging to Hesse. Heppenheim borders in the north on the town of Bensheim, in the northeast on the community of Lautertal and the town of Lindenfels, in the east on the communities of Fürth, Rimbach, Mörlenbach and Birkenau, in the south on the community of Laudenbach (Rhein-Neckar-Kreis, Baden-Württemberg), in the southwest on the towns of Viernheim and Lampertheim and in the west on the town of Lorsch. Besides the main town, Heppenheim has the outlying centres of Unter-Hambach, Ober-Hambach, Kirschhausen (with Igelsbach), Erbach, Sonderbach, Wald-Erlenbach, Mittershausen-Scheuerberg, and Ober-Laudenbach, which were in the course of municipal reform in Hesse amalgamated with Heppenheim with effect from 1 January 1972.