A mountain tree ended up on a flat city street and outgrew everything on it. Sycamore maples belong to the Alps and the uplands of central Europe, where they root in steep pasture and broken rock; this one stands on the gravel plain the Isar laid down, on Theresienstrasse in Maxvorstadt. Munich's 2021 natural monument ordinance protects it in one line, and that line is a compliment rather than a measurement: a strikingly handsome, dominantly grown tree, effective in the streetscape. Maxvorstadt was Munich's first planned expansion beyond the medieval walls, a grid drawn from 1805 and now the quarter of the university and the Pinakotheken. Theresienstrasse runs east to west through the middle of it, a long straight of shopfronts, institutes and parked bicycles, and the maple is the one thing on its stretch with a crown worth standing under. Nobody has put a date on it. The ordinance keeps no age column and no girth column, and no other source names this tree, so all that is on record is that the city looked at it and decided it was worth keeping. If you know when it went in, or have taken a tape around the trunk, tell us and we will add it.
In fruit
September to October: winged seeds that spin down in pairs
The line is our estimate of how much there is to see, not a measurement. Typical for this species where this tree stands; exact weeks shift with the year.
Theresienstraße 90, 80333 MünchenYou can recognise it as the one tree on this stretch of shopfronts and institutes with a crown worth standing under, a mountain species out of place on a flat gravel plain. It stands at Theresienstraße 90, Maxvorstadt.
Free, public land, no restrictions
In Maxvorstadt, a walk from the Josephsplatz tram stop
Sources
Where the facts on this page come from.
- In the official register: Naturdenkmal (Bayern LfU), no. ND-01959
- Munich Naturdenkmalverordnung 2021, Maxvorstadt 5
- lfu.bayern.de
