Etappe 06: BergZeitReise - von Neuberg an der Mürz auf die Schneealm

Emperor Franz Joseph I had the monastery adapted as a hunting lodge after 1850 and used it regularly for hunting stays. In addition, he had his own hunting lodge built in Mürzsteg in 1870, which has served as a summer retreat for the respective Federal President since 1947. When the Neuberg Railway was opened in 1879 as a standard-gauge branch line to the southern railroad line, the imperial family often traveled by train to Neuberg in the upper Mürz Valley. Passenger service was discontinued in 1996. In 2011, the Mürzzuschlag-Neuberg section was opened on the disused line as part of the R5 cycle route.

As early as the 15th century, the Neuberg monastery had started mining and iron production in the area. This reached its peak in the Neuberg ironworks in the 19th century with the largest steam hammer in the monarchy at that time . However, with the exhaustion of iron deposits in Altenberg, where mining had already been going on for centuries, the industry increasingly lost its basis; in 1924, the steel and rolling mill in Neuberg was shut down.

In the monastery there was already centuries ago briefly a glassworks . Since the summer of 2010, the "Kaiserhof" glass manufactory has once again been producing high-quality and artistic colored glass, and for many years the "Neuberg Culture Days" have formed one of the most important cultural initiatives in the region.