Former Wolfsegg-Traunthaler Kohlenwerks AG colliery at Hinterschlagen, Ampflwang, now operating as HAUSRUCKPARK outdoor leisure and adventure venue on former mining ground.
The site at Hinterschlagen, located approximately eight kilometres north of Ampflwang im Hausruckwald in Upper Austria, was a working colliery of the Wolfsegg-Traunthaler Kohlenwerks AG (WTK), extracting brown coal from the Hausruck lignite field until the sector's closure in 1991. The Hausruck coalfield was one of the principal brown coal producing regions in Upper Austria, with continuous industrial extraction by the WTK and its predecessors from the late eighteenth century. At Hinterschlagen, coal was extracted via the Rudolfstollen and related underground workings, with a mine railway — the Kohlebahn — transporting coal to the Brecher Buchleiten crusher, from which it was conveyed by cableway and later conveyor belt to the Zentralsortierungsanlage in Ampflwang for processing.
After the mine's closure the site passed into private hands and briefly operated as the "Bergbauerlebniswelt Hinterschlagen", a visitor attraction running mine railway rides and underground tours from around 1995. This operation ceased in the late 1990s when the private operator could not sustain necessary investment. The site is now operated as HAUSRUCKPARK, an outdoor adventure park offering off-road driving, archery, paintball and laser tag activities.
Brown coal extraction in the Hausruckviertel of Upper Austria began with the discovery of lignite deposits around 1760. By the end of the eighteenth century commercial extraction was under way. The Wolfsegg-Traunthaler Kohlenwerks- und Eisenbahngesellschaft, with its seat in Vienna and a works directorate at Wolfsegg am Hausruck, was formed in 1855–56 through the consolidation of field interests originally held by Alois Miesbach, Baron Rothschild and Graf Julien-Wallsee. The WTK subsequently acquired additional working rights in 1870, including the Bergbau des Grafen Arco at Windischhub, Hausruckedt and Eberschwang, effectively consolidating the entire Hausruck coal industry under a single operator.
From the mid-1920s the principal active extraction in the Hausruck was concentrated in the municipality of Ampflwang im Hausruckwald. The WTK operated multiple mining sectors across the Hausruck — including Wolfsegg, Thomasroith and Ampflwang — served by a network of narrow-gauge mine railways, tunnels and connecting infrastructure. The Ampflwang sector was linked to the associated Kraftwerk Timelkam, an 18-kilometre journey served by the Ampflwanger Bahn constructed by the WTK for the purpose. Coal from the outlying northern extraction fields, including the workings in and around Hinterschlagen and Illing, was transported by the Kohlebahn mine railway through the Heissler-Stollen tunnel to the Brecher Buchleiten coal crusher on the northern outskirts of Ampflwang. There the coal was crushed to a uniform size and conveyed to the Zentralsortierungsanlage — the central sorting and washing installation in Ampflwang — first by a 680-metre aerial ropeway and from 1964 by a conveyor belt.
The Zentralsortierungsanlage itself was built in 1925 and was among the most modern coal processing installations of its era. In 1988 a new coal washing plant replaced the old sorting installation; it operated for only seven years before the closure of the mine in 1995. The Hinterschlagen sector, including the Rudolfstollen and the associated mine railway infrastructure, closed in 1991, four years before the final closure of the WTK's last Ampflwang operations. The overall WTK mining operation at Ampflwang was finally liquidated on 25 May 1995, citing depletion of economically recoverable reserves, the expiration of coal supply contracts, and production costs exceeding world market prices, despite an estimated remaining reserve of more than 300 million tonnes in the broader Hausruck field.
Following the closure of the Hinterschlagen workings, the site — including the former mine railway station, the Rudolfstollen portal and associated rolling stock — passed to a private operator from the region. From approximately 1995, a visitor attraction called the "Bergbauerlebniswelt Hinterschlagen" operated on the site, offering rides on the mine railway with adapted seating in the coal wagons, entry into the Rudolfstollen, an underground film presentation about brown coal extraction using original archive footage, and guided tours with former miners. Contemporary accounts record that the attraction was well attended, particularly at weekends. However, the private operator was unable to finance the necessary capital investment from within the business and the attraction closed in the late 1990s.
The possibility of incorporating the Hinterschlagen site into the 2006 Oberösterreichische Landesausstellung "Kohle und Dampf" — which used the Zentralsortierungsanlage in Ampflwang as its main venue — was considered but ultimately not pursued, as public funding was directed to municipal and association-run projects rather than to the commercial private operator. As a result the infrastructure at Hinterschlagen — including rolling stock, mine railway trackwork, the Barbarakapelle, and the Rudolfstollen portal — was not restored for visitor access. By 2021 these remains were reported as deteriorating through lack of maintenance.
The site at Hinterschlagen is currently operated as HAUSRUCKPARK by a private business. The park offers outdoor adventure activities including off-road driving courses on approximately ten hectares of terrain for enduro motorcycles, trial bikes, quads, ATVs and four-wheel-drive vehicles; a 3D archery course; paintball on a course described as incorporating mining exhibits and rustic wooden structures; and laser tag. The HAUSRUCKPARK address is Hinterschlagen 6, Ampflwang im Hausruckwald.