Niedernhausen

Niedernhausen
Coat of arms
Niedernhausen
Location of Niedernhausen within Rheingau-Taunus-Kreis district
Coordinates: 50°10′N 8°19′E / 50.167°N 8.317°E / 50.167; 8.317Coordinates: 50°10′N 8°19′E / 50.167°N 8.317°E / 50.167; 8.317
Country	Germany
State	Hesse
Admin. region	Darmstadt
District	Rheingau-Taunus-Kreis
Government
• Mayor	Joachim Reimann (CDU)
Area
• Total	35.25 km2 (13.61 sq mi)
Elevation	254 - 592 m (−1,688 ft)
Population (2015-12-31)
• Total	14,544
• Density	410/km2 (1,100/sq mi)
Time zone	CET/CEST (UTC+1/+2)
Postal codes	65527
Dialling codes	06127
Vehicle registration	RÜD
Website	www.niedernhausen.de

Niedernhausen im Taunus is a municipality in the Rheingau-Taunus-Kreis in the Regierungsbezirk of Darmstadt in Hesse, Germany, with almost 15,000 inhabitants.

Niedernhausen lies in the Rhein-Taunus Nature Park in the west of the Frankfurt Rhine Main Region north of Wiesbaden. The main centre of Niedernhausen (which alone is home to more than half the community’s inhabitants) and the outlying centre of Königshofen stretch along the slopes of a dale. The heart of the community is found in the bottom of the dale. The community is surrounded by mixed forest covering 60% of the municipal area.

Niedernhausen lies on the south flank of the Taunus low mountain range, a fold range that stretches from the Niederwald (“Lower Forest”) near Rüdesheim am Rhein towards the northeast, on into the Wetterau near Bad Nauheim. This range is subdivided by two gaps, namely the Idstein Basin and the Saalburg Basin, into three parts: the Rheingau-Taunus, the Hochtaunus (“High Taunus”) and the Wetterau-Taunus. The outliers of the Idstein Basin reach as far as Niedernhausen in the form of the Autal, putting the community right on the east-west dividing line between the Rheingau-Taunus and the Hochtaunus.

The Taunus Ridge, which at the same time forms the watershed between the Rhine and Main drainage basin in the south and the Lahn drainage basin in the north, runs through the municipal area from southwest to northeast. Parts of this ridge and also parts of the Rheingau-Taunus are the Hohe Kanzel (“High Pulpit”), at 592 m above sea level the community’s highest elevation, and the Lenzenberg (492 m above sea level). South of these heights stretches the local recreation area and nature conservation area of Theißtal (or Theisstal) to the northeast on into the heart of Niedernhausen, north of which is the Engenhahn Valley (Engenhahner Tal), in which also runs the highway from high-lying Engenhahn to Niederseelbach in the outliers of the Idstein Basin. West of Niederseelbach stretches the Niedernhausen Basin. In the pit of the basin lies the community’s core (lowest point near the town hall at 254 m above sea level), on the south slopes Königshofen, and on the north the new municipal developments of Niedernhausen along with the outlying centre of Oberjosbach.