At its widest point, Aachen Forest is about 8.2 kilometres wide, and its greatest north-south extent is about 2.5 kilometres. It lies in the transition zone between the
Lower Rhine Plain and the
Rhenish Massif, at an average height of 220 metres above sea level. The Brandenberg is its highest peak at 355.4 metres, closely followed by the Klausberg at 354.7 metres. Its southern and south-western part runs seamlessly into the
Belgian State Forest, and its western part, in the region of
Vaalserberg hills, into the Dutch State Forest. The ridge runs from west to east, forming a watershed, the streams rising south of this line flow mostly into the
Göhl and then the
Meuse. Those that rise to the north eventually all flow into the
Wurm. The Aachen streams of the municipal forest, especially the Wurm, but also the
Pau,
Johannisbach,
Beverbach and Kannegießerbach, were of great importance to Aachen's textile industry. With the takeover of Burtschied's municipal forest in 1897, Aachen acquired the forest cemetery (
Waldfriedhof) with its
Bismarck Tower, and with the addition of Forst's woodlands in 1906, it gained the Lintert cemetery and, in 1980, the private forest of the Schönforst Estate which had been bought in the 1860s from Baron Carl von Nellessen. In 1925 the city finally acquired the Von Halfern Park from
Landrat Carl von Halfern, which merges into the northern edge of the municipal forest. In addition, in the 20th century, two housing estates belonging to the city of Aachen were built within the forest; a small one in the area of
Pommerotter Weg and another, the quarter of Preuswald, along the southern part of
Lütticher Straße. The Aachen Forest is dominated by a telecommunications tower owned by
Deutsche Telekom, built in 1984 and which is called the
Mulleklenkes in the Aachen dialect. ==Wartime history and coffee smuggling==