- This article is about the Capital city of Germany. For other uses, see Berlin (disambiguation).
The Brandenburg Gate, one of Berlin's best-known landmarks
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Berlin (help·info), IPA: [bɛɐˈliːn]], is the capital city as well as a state of Germany, and also the country's largest city.
Berlin is the political and cultural centre of Germany and, due to its division into West Berlin and East Berlin from 1949 - 1990, one of the most diverse cities in the European Union. Berlin is an important crossroads for the states of the expanding European Union, as well as the home of many of the national economic, cultural, and educational institutions of Germany. Berlin hosts some of the most prominent universities, research faculties, theatres, and museums in Europe. Berlin has also gained an international reputation for its festivals, nightlife and contemporary architecture.
Berlin is located in northeastern Germany, on the Rivers Spree and Havel, completely surrounded by the German federal state of Brandenburg. Founded in the early 13th century, Berlin was the capital of the March of Brandenburg and, after 1701, capital of the Kingdom of Prussia. In 1871, Berlin became capital of the German Empire and a focal point for the nation's history.
Since the reunification of Germany on 3 October 1990, Berlin has again been the capital of Germany. Berlin is also the seat of most of the executive and legislative branches of the German government.
History
- Main article: History of Berlin
Early in the 13th century, the twin cities of Berlin and Cölln were founded as part of the German expansion into the formerly Slavic lands east of the River Elbe. Each of the twin cities was built on an island in the River Spree. Cölln lay on what is now known as the Spree Island (Spreeinsel), while the original Berlin lay across an arm of the Spree on an island to the northeast, where the medieval churches of St. Mary (Marienkirche) and St. Nicholas (Nikolaikirche) now stand. Another arm of the Spree, since filled in, separated the original Berlin from the mainland to the northeast.
The first written mention of the city of Cölln dates to 1237, and that of Berlin dates to 1244. From the beginning, the two cities formed an economic and social unit. In 1307, the two cities were united politically. Over time, the twin cities came to be known simply as Berlin, the larger of the pair. The name Berlin probably stems from the Slavic root berl (swamp, marshy ground).
In 1415 Frederick I became the elector of the Margravate of Brandenburg, which he ruled until 1440. Subsequent members of the Hohenzollern family ruled until 1918 in Berlin, first as electors of Brandenburg, then as kings of Prussia, and finally as German emperors. The inhabitants of Berlin did not always welcome these changes.
In 1448 they rebelled in the “Berlin Indignation” against the construction of a new royal palace by Elector Frederick II Irontooth. This protest was not successful, however, and the citizenry lost many of its political and economic privileges. In 1451 Berlin became the royal residence of the Brandenburg electors, and Berlin had to give up its status as a free Hanseatic city. In 1539 the electors and the city officially became Protestant.
The Thirty Years War between 1618 and 1648 had devastating consequences for Berlin. A third of the houses were damaged, and the city lost half of its population. Frederick William, known as the “Great Elector”, succeeded his father as ruler in 1640. He initiated a policy of promoting immigration and religious tolerance. Over the following decades, Berlin expanded greatly in area and population with the founding of the new suburbs of Friedrichswerder, Dorotheenstadt, and Friedrichstadt, today the site of many government offices.
In 1671, fifty Jewish families from Austria were given a home in Berlin. With the Edict of Potsdam in 1685, Frederick William invited the French Huguenots to Brandenburg. More than 15,000 Huguenots came, of whom 6,000 settled in Berlin. Around 1700, approximately twenty percent of Berlin's residents were French, and their cultural influence was great. Many other immigrants came from Bohemia, Poland, and Salzburg.
With coronation of Frederick I in 1701 as king of Prussia, Berlin became the capital of Prussia. On 1 January 1710, the cities of Berlin, Cölln, Friedrichswerder, Dorotheenstadt, and Friedrichstadt were united as the “Royal Capital and Residence of Berlin.” The Industrial Revolution transformed Berlin during the 19th century; the city's economy and population expanded dramatically, and it became the main rail hub and economic centre of Germany. Additional suburbs soon developed and increased the area and population of Berlin. In 1861, outlying suburbs including Wedding, Moabit, and several others were incorporated into Berlin. In 1871, Berlin became capital of the newly founded German Empire.
At the end of World War I in 1918, the Weimar Republic was proclaimed in Berlin. In 1920, the Greater Berlin Act united dozens of suburban cities, villages, and estates around Berlin into a greatly expanded city. After this expansion, Berlin had a population of around 4 million. 1920s Berlin was a very exciting and interesting city.
After the National Socialists (Nazis) were elected in 1933, Berlin became the capital of the Third Reich. The Nazis used the 1936 Summer Olympic Games in Berlin for propaganda purposes. There were also plans to rebuild Berlin as “Germania, Capital of the World.” However, these plans were put aside because of World War II.
Nazi rule destroyed Berlin's Jewish community, which numbered 160,000 before the Nazi seizure of power. After the brutal pogrom of Kristallnacht in 1938, thousands of the city's Jews were imprisoned in the concentration camp at nearby Sachsenhausen. The last Jews in Berlin (except for a few married to non-Jews) were marched to the Grunewald railway station over several weeks in early 1943 and shipped in cattle cars to death camps such as Auschwitz.
During the war, large parts of Berlin were destroyed by bombs and street combat. After the occupation of the city by the Red Army and the German surrender in 1945, Berlin was divided into four sectors, analogous to the occupation zones into which Germany was divided. The sectors of the Western Allies (the United States, United Kingdom, and France) formed West Berlin, while the sector of the Soviet Union formed East Berlin.
For Berlin as a whole, all four allies retained shared oversight. However, the growing political differences between the Western Allies and the Soviet Union led the Soviet Union, which controlled the territory surrounding Berlin, to impose the Berlin Blockade, an economic blockade of West Berlin from 1948 to 1949. The Allies successfully overcame this blockade through the Berlin Airlift.
The Berlin Wall in 1986, brightly painted on the western side. Those trying to cross the so-called death strip on the eastern side could be shot.
In 1949 the democratic Federal Republic of Germany was founded in West Germany, while the Marxist-Leninist German Democratic Republic (GDR) was proclaimed in East Germany. The founding of the two German states increased Cold War tensions. West Berlin was surrounded by the territory of the GDR. Due to Berlin's isolation and vulnerability, the Federal Republic established its provisional capital in Bonn. The GDR, however, proclaimed East Berlin, which included most of the historic centre, as its capital. The east-west conflict culminated in the construction of the Berlin Wall between East and West Berlin and other barriers around West Berlin by the GDR on 13 August 1961. West Berlin was now de facto a part of the Federal Republic of Germany, although with a unique legal status, while East Berlin was de facto a part of the GDR.
The eastern and western portions of Berlin were now completely separated. It was possible for Westerners to pass from one to the other only through strictly controlled checkpoints. For most Easterners, travel to West Berlin or West Germany was no longer possible. In 1971, the Four-Power Agreement on Berlin was signed. While the Soviet Union applied the oversight of the four powers only to West Berlin, the Western Allies emphasized in a 1975 note to the United Nations their position that four-power oversight applied to Berlin as a whole.
In 1989 pressure from the East German population brought a transition to democracy in the GDR, and Easterners gained free access across the Berlin Wall, which was quickly demolished. In 1990 the two parts of Germany were reunified as the Federal Republic of Germany and Berlin became the German capital according to the unification treaty. In 1991, the Bundestag (the lower house of the German parliament) decided, after a controversial public discussion, that the city should again be the seat of the German national government. Most branches of the German government relocated from Bonn to Berlin during the subsequent years. On 1 September 1999 the German parliament and government began their work in Berlin.
Geography
Geographic Setting
Berlin is located in eastern Germany, about 70 kilometres (40 miles) west of the border with Poland. Berlin's landscape was shaped by ice sheets during the last Ice Age. The city centre lies along the river Spree in the Berlin-Warsaw 'urstromtal' (ancient river valley), formed by water flowing from melting ice sheets at the end of the last Ice Age. The urstromtal lies between the low plateaus of the Barnim, to the north, and the Teltow, to the south. In Berlin's westernmost borough, Spandau, the Spree meets the river Havel, which flows from north to south through western Berlin. The course of the Havel is much like a chain of lakes. The largest lakes along the Havel are the Tegelsee and Großer Wannsee. A series of lakes also feeds into the upper Spree, which flows through eastern Berlin's largest lake, Großer Müggelsee.
The River Havel flows through a series of lakes in western Berlin.
Substantial parts of present-day Berlin extend onto the low plateaus that line the Spree Valley. Large parts of the boroughs Reinickendorf and Pankow lie on the Barnim, while most of the boroughs Charlottenburg-Wilmersdorf, Steglitz-Zehlendorf, Tempelhof-Schöneberg, and Neukölln are on the Teltow. The borough of Spandau lies partly within the Berlin urstromtal and partly on the Nauen Plain, which stretches to the west of Berlin.
The highest elevations in Berlin are the Teufelsberg in the borough of Charlottenburg-Wilmersdorf and the Müggelberge in the borough of Treptow-Köpenick. Both hills have an elevation of about 115 metres (377 feet), and are in fact artificial piles of rubble from the ruins of World War II.
Climate
The city has a moderate climate. The mean annual temperature for Berlin-Dahlem is 9.4 degrees Celsius (48.9 degrees Fahrenheit) and its mean annual precipitation totals 578 millimeters (22.8 inches). The warmest months are June, July, and August, with mean temperatures of 16.7 to 17.9 degrees Celsius (62.1 to 64.2 degrees Fahrenheit). The coldest are December, January, and February, with mean temperatures of -0.4 to 1.2 degrees Celsius (31.3 to 34.2 degrees Fahrenheit). The months with the highest precipitation are June and August, which average 70.7 millimeters (2.78 inches) and 65.3 millimeters (2.57 inches), respectively. The months with the lowest mean precipitation are October and February, with averages of 35.8 millimeters (1.41 inches) and 36.7 millimeters (1.44 inches), respectively.
Demography
Berlin has 3,393,933 inhabitants (as of September 2005) in an area of 891.75 square kilometres (344.31 mi²). Thus, the population density of the region amounts to 3,806 inhabitants per square kilometre (9,857/square mile). Berlin residents' average age is 41.7 years (as of 2004). A total of 450,900 inhabitants are foreigners who are citizens of 185 nations (as of December 2004). Among them, approximately 36,000 citizens come from the nearest neighbouring country, Poland, and 119,000 are from Turkey—Berlin is the largest Turkish municipality in Europe outside of Turkey. In 2004, 22.3% of the population were Protestants, 9.1% were Catholics, 6.2% were Muslims, and 0.4% were Jews.
Between approximately the 1890s and the mid-1920s, Berlin was the fourth-largest urban area in the world after London, New York, and Paris. Today, it is the sixth-largest urban area in the European Union, and approximately the 80th-largest urban area in the world.
For a table showing the historical development of Berlin's population, see Berlin population statistics.
Economy
Berlin was once a major manufacturing centre and the economic and financial hub of Germany. The city suffered economically during the Cold War, when West Berlin was isolated geographically and East Berlin suffered from poor economic decisions made by East Germany’s central planners. Since reunification, the city has relied increasingly on economic activity in the service sectors.
Economic history
Berlin was founded at a point where trade routes crossed the River Spree and quickly became a commercial centre. During the early modern period, the city prospered from its role as Prussian capital by manufacturing luxury goods for the Prussian court and supplies for the Prussian military.
During the mid-1800s, the Industrial Revolution transformed the city’s economy. Berlin became Germany’s main rail hub and a centre of rail locomotive manufacturing. The city became a leader in the manufacture of other kinds of machinery as well, and developed an important chemical manufacturing sector. Toward the end of the 19th century, Berlin became a world leader in the then cutting-edge sector of electrical equipment manufacturing As the de facto centre of the German Zollverein, or Customs Union, and later the seat of imperial Germany’s central bank, Berlin became Germany’s banking and financial centre as well.
Berlin suffered from both the German inflation of the 1920s and the Great Depression of the 1930s. The city’s economy revived as a centre of armaments production under the Nazis, but it lost a pool of entrepreneurial talent when the Nazis forced Jewish businessmen to sell their holdings and ultimately massacred most who did not flee Germany. World War II severely damaged Berlin’s industrial infrastructure, and Soviet expropriation of machinery and other capital equipment as “reparations” further damaged Berlin’s industrial base. Soviet restrictions on transport impeded communication with West Germany and ended hopes that Berlin would resume a role as Germany’s financial centre; most banks established headquarters in Frankfurt. In East Berlin, central planners rebuilt a manufacturing sector, but one that was not competitive internationally or responsive to market demand. West Berlin’s economy grew increasingly dependent on state subsidies and on its role as an educational and research centre.
Berlin’s and Germany’s unification brought the collapse of many of East Berlin’s producers, which could not compete with market-disciplined Western competitors. Massive unemployment was only partly compensated by the growth of jobs in the construction and infrastructural sectors involved in rebuilding and upgrading East Berlin’s infrastructure. The arrival of the federal government in 1999 brought some economic stimulus to Berlin. Berlin’s service sectors have also benefited from improved transportation and communications links to the surrounding region. The service sectors have become the city’s economic mainstay.
Berlin’s Sony Center and newly built corporate offices, 2005
Economic structure and trends
Berlin's economy has shrunk over the past decade. The gross state product totaled €77.9 billion in 2004. This compares with €77.4 billion in 1995. Correcting for the effects of inflation, however, this represents an 11% reduction in the size of Berlin's economy over 9 years.
The biggest declines came in the construction and manufacturing sectors. Construction registered a real decline of 64.2% between 1995 and 2004, a decline that coincides with the completion of a range of projects for modernizing the eastern boroughs' infrastructure, improving links between the western boroughs and their neighbours, and building new government and corporate offices. Meanwhile, the city’s manufacturing sector continued a gradual decline, shrinking by 24.3% in real terms over the 9-year period.
Berlin’s service sectors were somewhat more robust, growing 7.4% in nominal terms from 1995 to 2004, but declining by 5.0% over the same period after adjusting for inflation. Tourism, transport, and communications each showed substantial declines of more than 10% in real terms over this period. In fact, the only sector of Berlin’s economy to grow in inflation-adjusted terms between 1995 and 2004 was the real estate sector, which grew by 3.5% over the 9-year period. Other service sectors showed modest declines in inflation-adjusted terms.
In terms of composition, Berlin's gross state product in 2004 was dominated by the service sectors, which made up 76.9% of the economy. The largest service sectors were real estate (29.2%) and government services (28.3%). Goods-producing sectors accounted for 16.2% of the economy, with manufacturing alone accounting for 10.5% and construction for 2.9%. Agriculture, forestry, and fisheries made up 0.1% of the economy. Imputed banking fees made up 3.0% of the city’s economy. Net government transfers and subsidies accounted for the remainder (9.7%) of Berlin's gross state product.
Before the reunification of Germany and the two Berlins in 1990, West Berlin received substantial subsidies from the West German state to compensate for its geographic isolation from West Germany. Many of those subsidies were phased out after 1990. The reduced financial support for the city and its gradual economic decline have produced fiscal difficulties for Berlin's city government and forced it to cut funding for various programs.
Infrastructure
As Germany's largest city, and one of the largest cities in Europe, Berlin developed a complex transportation and energy-supply infrastructure before World War II. After the war, West Berlin was cut off from the surrounding territory and had to develop independent infrastructures. Meanwhile, the government of East Germany built rail lines and highways that allowed traffic between East Berlin and the western part of East Germany to bypass West Berlin. The political reunification of East and West Berlin has led to the reintegration of Berlin's transportation and energy-supply with the infrastructures of the surrounding region.
Public transport and rail lines
Public transport within Berlin is provided by the S-Bahn—operated by the firm S-Bahn Berlin—and by the U-Bahn, Straßenbahn, bus, and ferries—operated by the Berliner Verkehrsbetriebe, or BVG. The S-Bahn is a mostly aboveground urban railway system. The U-Bahn is the city's mainly underground metro or subway system. The Straßenbahn is a tram (trolley) system that operates mainly in eastern Berlin. Buses provide extensive service linking outlying districts with the city centre and the U-Bahn and S-Bahn. Almost all means of public transport—U- & S- Bahn, trams, buses and most ferries—can be accessed with the same ticket. Public transportation in Berlin works on a sort of honor system: There is no need to show or scan one's ticket in order to get on a bus, tram, or train. However, plainclothed transit authorities frequently conduct random checks in which they board a vehicle and demand that everyone onboard show their ticket. Anyone who does not produce a valid ticket is given a stiff fine.
As the network map at the right shows, the inner city is crossed from east to west by the elevated main line (Stadtbahn), which carries S-Bahn trains as well as regional and long-distance trains. This main line passes through most of the city's long-distance and regional train stations, including Berlin-Charlottenburg, Berlin Zoologischer Garten (Zoo), Berlin Hauptbahnhof, Friedrichstraße, Alexanderplatz, and Berlin Ostbahnhof. Along the north-south axis, the U-Bahn 9 line carries the largest passenger volume, supplemented by the north-south line of the S-Bahn. The north-south and east-west lines of the S-Bahn cross at Friedrichstrasse.
The last key component of Berlin's rail network is the S-Bahn ring (Ringbahn) that forms a circle around the inner city and crosses the main line at Westkreuz (“west crossing”) and Ostkreuz (“east crossing”). A number of regional and regional express lines connect Berlin with the surrounding region. The city is also served by the freight railyard at Seddin, south of Potsdam.
There are useful online resources for getting around Berlin using public transport, such as the route planner or a map of the current public transport network. See also List of Berlin metro stations.
The U-Bahn station at Gleisdreieck
Long-distance rail lines connect Berlin with all of the major cities of Germany and with many cities in neighbouring European countries. Regional rail lines provide access to the surrounding region of Brandenburg and eastern Germany.
Berlin was once a major hub of the central European railway network. World War II and the political division of Germany disrupted Berlin's railway network. Today only two pre-1945 long-distance stations, Ostbahnhof and Zoologischer Garten, remain in service. In the early 1950s, in an effort by the East German government to isolate West Berlin, railway services were diverted away from terminuses in West Berlin. The following stations became disused and were demolished during the 1950s and 1960s.
Motorways
Berlin's inner city is partly surrounded by a motorway (superhighway, expressway, or freeway), the A 100, that forms a half circle to the west of the centre. There are plans to extend this motorway to form a full circle around the inner city. The A 10 motorway forms a full circle around the exterior of Berlin.
From the A 100, within the city, the following motorways extend outward to the A 10 and beyond:
- A 113 to the southeast (toward Dresden and Cottbus). This motorway currently begins in the far southeastern part of Berlin. By 2007, the connection to the A 100, currently under construction, should be complete.
- A 115 to the southwest (toward Hannover and Leipzig). The segment of this motorway inside the A 10 is still commonly known as the Avus.
In addition, in the northern part of the city, the A 114 runs from Pankow to and beyond the A 10 toward Szczecin in Poland.
Airports
Berlin has three commercial airports—Tegel International Airport (TXL), Tempelhof International Airport (THF), and Schönefeld International Airport (SXF). Schönefeld lies just outside Berlin's southeastern border in the state of Brandenburg, while the other two airports lie within the city. Tempelhof handles only short-distance and commuter flights, and there are plans to close the airport and transfer its traffic to Berlin's other two airports. There are longer-term plans to close Tegel as well. Schönefeld is currently undergoing expansion. Berlin's airport authority aims to transfer all of Berlin's air traffic sometime after 2010 to a greatly expanded airport at Schönefeld, to be renamed Berlin Brandenburg International Airport. However, some residents of Berlin and Brandenburg oppose the planned expansion of service at Schönefeld. For more information on Berlin's airports, see the website of Berlin Airports.
Canals and ports
Berlin is linked to the Baltic Sea, the North Sea, and the River Rhine by an extensive network of rivers and canals. The Elbe-Havel Kanal links the River Havel, flowing from Berlin, both with the River Elbe—which flows into the North Sea at Hamburg—and with the Mittellandkanal, which stretches across Germany to a network of canals that provide a link to the River Rhine. The Oder-Spree Kanal links Berlin's River Spree with the River Oder, which flows into the Baltic Sea near Szczecin.
The Teltowkanal at Tempelhof
The most important canals with Berlin run roughly east to west between the Rivers Spree and Havel. The canal system to the north of the Spree begins with the Berlin-Spandauer Schiffartskanal, which runs from the Spree near Lehrter Bahnhof to the edge of Charlottenburg, where it connects with the Westhafenkanal, which reenters the Spree farther west in Charlottenburg, and with the Hohenzollernkanal, which runs to the River Havel above (north of) Spandau.
The main canal to the south of the Spree is the Teltowkanal, which runs from an arm of the upper Spree south of Köpenick through the southern part of Berlin to an arm of the Havel just east of Potsdam. A shorter canal, the Landwehrkanal, parallels the Spree just to the south of the river. It begins at the Spree between Treptow and Kreuzberg and rejoins the Spree in Charlottenburg. The Neuköllner Schiffahrtskanal connects the Landwehrkanal with the Teltowkanal; while the Britzer Zweigkanal connects the Teltowkanal with the Spree at Baumschulenweg.
Berlin's largest port is the Westhafen (“west port”), in Moabit (Mitte), with an area of 173,000 m² (42.75 acres). It lies at the intersection of the Berlin-Spandauer Schiffahrtkanal, the Westhafenkanal, and the Hohenzollernkanal. It handles the transshipment of grain and pieced and heavy goods. The Südhafen (“south port”), which actually lies along the Havel in Spandau, in far western Berlin, covers an area of about 103,000 m² (25.5 acres) and also handles the transshipment of pieced and heavy goods. The Osthafen (“east port”), with an area of 57,500 m² (14.2 acres), lies along the Spree in Friedrichshain. The Hafen Neukölln, with only 19,000 m² (4.7 acres), is located along the Neuköllner Schiffahrtskanal in Neukölln. It handles the transshipment of building materials.
Power supply
The power supply of Berlin has some peculiarities. In World War II it was planned to supply the grid of Berlin over an HVDC-underground cable from Dessau power station. The construction of this facility was begun in 1943, but was abandoned (see Elbe-Project).
During the time of the division, the power grid of former West Berlin was cut off from the power grid of the surrounding countryside. Electricity supply was from thermal power stations in the city (Reuter, Wilmersdorf ,etc.). For buffering the load peaks, accumulators were installed in the 1980s in some of these power stations, which were connected by static inverters to the power grid and were loaded during times of low power consumption and unloaded during times of high consumption. In 1993 the power connections to the surrounding country, which were broken in 1951, were restored again. In the western districts of Berlin nearly all power lines are underground cables - only a 380 kV and a 110 kV-line, which run from Reuter power station to the urban motorway, are overhead lines. In Berlin there is the longest 380 kV three phase cable, the 380kV-crossing Berlin. It may be the most expensive power line in Germany (SEO).
Berlin's power supply is operated by the Swedish firm Vattenfall. The firm has come under criticism for relying more heavily than other electricity producers in Germany on lignite (brown coal) as an energy source, because burning lignite produces harmful emissions. However, the firm has announced a commitment to shift towards reliance on cleaner, renewable energy sources.
Government
The state
Berlin is the national capital of the Federal Republic of Germany. Since German reunification on 3 October 1990 it has been one of the three city states, together with Hamburg and Bremen, among the present 16 German states or Bundesländer.
Distribution of seats in the Berlin House of Representatives (
Abgeordnetenhaus)
The city and state parliament is the House of Representatives (Abgeordnetenhaus) with 141 seats. Berlin's executive body is the Senate of Berlin (Senat von Berlin). The Senate of Berlin consists of the governing mayor (Regierender Bürgermeister) and up to eight senators holding ministerial portfolios. The governing mayor is both lord mayor of the city (Oberbürgermeister der Stadt) and prime minister of the federal state (Ministerpräsident des Bundeslandes) at the same time. The office of Berlin's governing mayor is in the Rotes Rathaus (Red City Hall). Presently (January 2006), this office is held by Klaus Wowereit of the Social Democratic Party (SPD). The city's government is based on a coalition between the SPD and Die Linke.PDS, a party formed by a merger of the Party of Democratic Socialism (PDS), the successor to the former East German communist party, and a breakaway faction of left-wing former members of the SPD. For earlier mayors, see the list of Mayors of Berlin.
Berlin's boroughs and localities
Berlin's boroughs
(Bezirke)
Berlin is subdivided into 12 boroughs (Bezirke in German, also sometimes called districts in English). Each borough is subdivided into a number of localities (Ortsteil in German, also sometimes called subdistricts or neighbourhoods in English), which represent the traditional urbanised areas that inhabitants identify with. Some of these have been rearranged several times over the years. At present the city of Berlin consists of 96 such localities. The localities are often subdivided into a number of city neighbourhoods (usually called Kiez in German) representing small residential areas.
Each borough is governed by a borough council (Bezirksamt) consisting of ten councillors (Stadträte) and a borough mayor (Bezirksbürgermeister). The borough council is elected by the borough assembly (Bezirksverordnetenversammlung). The boroughs of Berlin are not independent municipalities. The power of borough governments is limited and subordinate to the Senate of Berlin. The borough mayors form the Council of Mayors (Rat der Bürgermeister), led by the city's governing mayor (Regierender Bürgermeister), which advises the Senate.
The localities have no government bodies of their own, even though most of the localities have historic roots in older municipalities that predate the formation of Greater Berlin on 1 October 1920. The subsequent position of locality representative (Ortsvorsteher) was discontinued in favour of borough mayors.
For a map and a list of the current and former borough names, see Berlin's 2001 administrative reform. For a list of the city's current boroughs and localities, see Boroughs and localities of Berlin. For a table showing the population of Berlin's boroughs, see Berlin population statistics.
Education
Berlin is perhaps Germany's most important centre of higher education and research, with four universities, numerous professional and technical colleges, and a large number of research institutes.
Universities, colleges, and research institutions
Berlin's Humboldt Universität
Around 150,000 students attend the universities and professional/technical colleges. The three largest universities alone account for around 110,000 students. These are the Freie Universität Berlin with 40,840 students, the Humboldt Universität zu Berlin with 36,423 students, and the Technische Universität Berlin with 31, 547 students. In addition to these universities, there is a wide range of professional and technical colleges training students in a wide range of disciplines, from business and management to the arts.
Berlin also has a large concentration of research institutions independent of, or only loosely connected to its universities. Together with its universities, these research institutions make Berlin one of the most important centres for research in Germany and indeed Europe.
For a list of Berlin's universities, colleges, and research institutions, see Universities, colleges, and research institutions in Berlin.
Primary and secondary schools
Berlin has a six-year primary school program. After completing primary school, students may enter one of four types of secondary school: the Hauptschule, the Realschule, the Gymnasium, and the Gesamtschule. The secondary school program also totals six years. (For more information on the German educational system, see Education in Germany.)
Culture and sights
Berlin is noted for its numerous cultural institutions, some of which are famous even outside of Germany. In addition, cultural diversity and tolerance remain from the time when West Berlin took pride in its role as a "free city" with the motto "something for everyone." Its current situation and future prospects, however, are strongly influenced by the city's financial crisis, with talk of merging or closing opera companies and concerns about the cost of subsidies for cultural institutions.
Berlin offers one of the most diverse and vibrant nightlife scenes in Europe. After the fall of the Berlin Wall in 1989 many buildings in the former city centre of East Berlin (today the district Mitte) were renovated. Many had not been rebuilt since World War II. Illegally occupied by young people, they became a fertile ground for all sorts of underground and counter-culture gatherings. It was also home to many nightclubs, including Tacheles, Techno clubs Tresor, WMF, Ufo and E-Werk.
Digital art inspired by Berlin's Loveparade
Berlin's annual Carnival of Cultures, a multi-ethnic street parade, and Chistopher Street Day celebrations, Central Europe's largest gay-lesbian pride event, are openly supported by the city's government.*[1]**[2]. Berlin is also well-known for the techno carnival Loveparade.
Berlin has a rich art scene, and it is home to hundreds of art galleries. The city is host to the Art Forum annual international art fair. Despite the city's high unemployment levels, many young Germans and artists continue to settle in the city, and Berlin has established itself as an important centre of youth and pop culture in Europe.
Signs of this expanding role were the 2003 announcement that the annual Popkomm, Europe's largest music industry convention, would move to Berlin after 15 years in Cologne. Shortly thereafter, German MTV also decided to move its headquarters and main studios from Munich to Berlin. Universal Music opened its European headquarters on the banks of the River Spree in an area known as the mediaspree.
Media
Berlin is the headquarters of many regional and national broadcasters. In addition to several television stations, there are a large number of private radio stations. The public broadcasters RBB and Deutsche Welle TV also have their headquarters in Berlin. Most national broadcasters account for Berlin's political role as capital with a broadcasting studio in the city.
Berlin has Germany's largest number of daily newspapers, with three major local broadsheets and three major tabloids, as well as national dailies of varying sizes, each with different political affiliations. In addition, several weekly papers publish ads, and Berlin has three alternative weeklies focusing on culture and entertainment.
Berlin is also the headquarters of two major German-language publishing houses: Walter de Gruyter and Springer, each of which publishes books, periodicals, and multimedia products.
Film industry and films about Berlin
Berlin is the centre of the German film industry, partly due to the existence of the Babelsberg Studios and many important film and TV production companies like UFA, Senator Film, Goldkind etc. Many international movies and European co-productions have been filmed there. Berlin is also home of the European Film Academy, the German Film Academy and host of the Berlinale film festival. There are many films that were set in or portray the special "Berlin-Atmosphere" from different eras, among them are:
- Die Sinfonie der Großstadt - 1927 Documentary Type Film "Day in the life of Berlin"
- Berlin Alexanderplatz - 1920s Berlin
- M - Early 1930s Berlin
- The Testament of Dr. Mabuse - 1933 Berlin
- Germany, Year Zero - Shows the nightmarishly dilapidated remains of 1945 Berlin, post WWII
- One, Two, Three - Cold War before the Wall 1961
- Funeral in Berlin 1966 Cold War Thriller - A bit dated, filmed in Berlin with some nice scenes in Kreuzberg
- Cabaret - Filmed in 1972, set in the early 1930s
- Christiane F. - Wir Kinder vom Bahnhof Zoo - 1970s
- Sonnenallee - A teen comedy set in East Berlin in the 1970s
- Taxi zum Klo - A gritty and groundbreaking 1981 film documenting gay sex and culture in West Berlin
- Linie 1 - 1988 Film of the 1986 Musical about U-Bahn Line 1 in West Berlin
- Coming Out - East Germany's first and only gay film, a love story set in East Berlin, which premiered, coincidentally, on the evening in 1989 when the Berlin Wall came down
- Good bye, Lenin! - Set in East Berlin in 1989
- Der Himmel über Berlin (Wings of Desire) - A cult film about divided city by Wim Wenders from 1987
- Run Lola Run - Filmed 1998 in post-reunification Berlin
- Hedwig and the Angry Inch - A cult film and musical about a German singer-transvestite who escapes East Berlin in 1989 (2001)
- Der Untergang (Downfall) - 2004 German film portraying the final days of the Third Reich in Hitler's bunker
Museums
The Bode Museum at the northern tip of the Spree Island
Berlin has a large number of museums. As early as 1841, the Museum Island—in the northern part of the Spree Island between the Spree and the Kupfergraben—was designated a “district dedicated to art and antiquities” by a royal decree. Subsequently, several museum buildings were constructed there. These were the Altes Museum (Old Museum) in the Lustgarten, and the Neues Museum (New Museum), Alte Nationalgalerie (Old National Gallery), Pergamon Museum, and Bode Museum at the far northern end of the island. While these buildings once housed distinct collections, the names of the buildings no longer necessarily correspond to the names of the collections they house.
For example, the Altes Museum and the Pergamon Museum together house the Collection of Classical Antiquities, [3] a collection of ancient art and artifacts. The Pergamon Museum also houses the world-renowned Museum of the Ancient Near East [4] and the Museum of Islamic Art [5].
The Egyptian Museum and Paypyrus Collection [6] is currently situated and on show on the upper floor of the Altes Museum, beside the Berliner Dom.
The Museum for Pre-and Early History remains at the Charlottenburg Palace until the Neues Museum is renovated. In the case of the Alte Nationalgalerie, [7] its collection of 19th-century painting and sculpture carries the same name as the building that houses it. However, the Bode Museum, which underwent extensive renovation during the early 2000s, will house the Sculpture Collection and Museum of Byzantine Art [8] and the Numismatic Collection [9] when it reopens in 2006.
Outside of the Museum Island, there is a wide variety of museums. The Gemäldegalerie[10] (Painting Gallery) focuses on the paintings of the "old masters" from the 13th to the 18th centuries, while the Neue Nationalgalerie [11] (New National Gallery, built by Ludwig Mies van der Rohe) specialises in 20th-century European painting. The Bauhaus Archive [12] is an architecture museum. The Jewish Museum Berlin [13] has a standing exhibition on 2,000 years of German-Jewish history. The Grunewald Hunting Lodge (Jagdschloss Grunewald) [14] contains a carefully chosen collection of paintings from the 15th to the 19th centuries. In Dahlem, there are several museums of world art and culture, such as the Museum of Indian Art [15], the Museum of East Asian Art [16], the Ethnological Museum [17], the Museum of European Cultures [18], as well as the Allied Museum [19] (a museum of the Cold War), the Brücke Museum [20] (an art museum), and the Domäne Dahlem [21] (an open-air agricultural museum. In Lichtenberg, on the grounds of the former East German Ministry for State Security (Stasi), stands the Stasi Museum [22] (German Language). The Wall Museum, also known as Museum at Checkpoint Charlie [23], shows moments from the history of the divided Berlin.
Other museums in Berlin include the following:
- Archenhold Observatory (Archenhold-Sternwarte) [24]
- The Berggruen Collection (Picasso and his times) [25]
- Berlin State Gallery [26]
- Berlin Underground Society, offering tours and documentation of Berlin's subterranean structures [27]
- Berlin Wall Documentation Center [28]
- Broehan Museum [29]
- Deutsche Guggenheim Museum [30]
- Gas Lamp Open-Air Museum, adjacent to S-Bahnhof Tiergarten (see section on Street lighting)[31]
- Gay Museum (Schwules Museum) [32]
- German Film Museum [33]
- German Museum of Technology in Kreuzberg, located at the site of an old freight railyard [34]
- Hamburger Bahnhof: Museum of the Present, with exhibits of contemporary art [35]
- Museum of Natural History [36]
- Kaethe Kollwitz Museum [37]
- Museum of Mail and Telecommunication [38]
- Museum of Medical History [39]
- Prussian Palaces and Gardens in Berlin [40]
- Subway/Underground Museum [41]
- Vitra Design Museum [42]
Theatres
Opera houses
Sports
Zoos and botanical gardens
Other tourist attractions
Even though Berlin does have a number of impressive buildings from earlier centuries, the city's appearance today is mainly shaped by the key role it played in Germany's history in the 20th century. Each of the national governments based in Berlin — the 1871 German Empire, the Weimar Republic, Nazi Germany, East Germany, and now the reunified Germany — initiated ambitious construction programmes, each with its own distinctive character. Berlin was devastated by bombing raids during World War II, and many of the old buildings that escaped the bombs were eradicated in the 1950s and 1960s in both West and East. Much of this destruction was caused by overambitious architecture programmes, especially to build new residential or business quarters and main roads. It would not be an exaggeration to say that no other city in the world offers Berlin's unusual mix of architecture, especially 20th-century architecture. The city's tense and unique recent history has left it with a distinctive array of sights.
Not much is left of the Berlin Wall. The East Side Gallery in Friedrichshain near the Oberbaumbrücke ("Upper Turnpike Bridge") over the Spree preserves a portion of the Wall. Architectural styles still sometimes reveal whether one is in the former eastern or western part of the city. In the eastern part, many Plattenbauten can be found, reminders of Eastern Bloc ambitions to create complete residential areas with fixed ratios of shops, kindergartens and schools. Another difference between former east and west is in the design of little red and green men on pedestrian crossing lights (Ampelmännchen in German); the eastern versions received an opt-out during the standardisation of road traffic signs after re-unification, and have survived to become a popular icon in tourist products. They are however starting to appear in western Berlin too.
Historical sights in the city centre
- The Brandenburg Gate and Unter den Linden, symbols of Berlin, Prussia, and now Germany. The Brandenburg Gate appears on German Euro coins.
- Reichstag building, the old and new seat of the German parliament, renovated by Sir Norman Foster. Features a glass dome in which you can walk around and watch the parliamentarians from above.
- Gendarmenmarkt, arguably the most beautiful square in Berlin, surrounded by two famous cathedrals and the concert hall.
- Berlin victory column, monument to Prussia's victories.
- The Berliner Dom, an historic cathedral. A large crypt houses the remains of the Prussian royal family.
- Cathedral of St. Hedwig (St.-Hedwigs-Kathedrale)
- Nikolaiviertel with the Nikolaikirche an historical city core, founded in the 13th century.
- Schloss Bellevue, now the residence of the German President
- Schloss Charlottenburg, the largest surviving historical palace in Berlin
- The Neptunbrunnen, a famous fountain in Berlin Mitte.
- Tiergarten is Berlin's largest park and a masterpiece of park design.
- Britzer Garten with the largest sundial in Europe and Volkspark Mariendorf
Cold War and sightseeing in the former East Berlin
Synagogue in the Oranienburger Straße
- The Palast der Republik ("Palace of the Republic"), the former East German parliament building and civic centre. It is seen by some as ugly, although former East Berliners remember with affection restaurants, shops, clubs, and the concerts that took place there in the 1980s. Although it has some significance as a historical tourist attraction, the German Parliament voted for its demolition which started in February of 2006.
The Palast der Republik is built on the site of the Berlin City Palace, which was demolished in 1950 by the Communists. The Palace Square was renamed Marx-Engels-Platz at the same time.
- The Fernsehturm (TV tower), the highest building in the city at 368 m (1207 ft), and the second largest structure in Europe (after Moscow's Ostankino Tower). The Fernsehturm is easily visible throughout most of the central districts of Berlin, and boasts one of the fastest lifts in Europe, at 45 metres per minute (148 ft/min)
- Alexanderplatz, formerly East Berlin's major shopping center, and home to the Centrum-Warenhaus, which was the DDR's department store. It is now a thoroughly Westernized shopping centre, belonging to the Kaufhof chain.
- East Side Gallery a memorial for freedom based on the last parts of the Berlin Wall
- Rotes Rathaus (the Red City Hall), historic town hall famous for its distinctive red-brick architecture
- Rathaus Schöneberg with John-F.-Kennedy-Platz, whence John F. Kennedy made his famous "Ich bin ein Berliner!" speech.
- Checkpoint Charlie, remains and a museum about one of the crossing points (albeit restricted to non-Germans and Allied forces) in the Berlin Wall. The museum, which is a private venture, exhibits interesting material about people who devised ingenious plans to leave the East, but is controversial in the city for its propagandistic Cold War didactics and publicity stunts that many consider tasteless.
Sights of modern Berlin
- Potsdamer Platz, an entire quarter built from scratch after 1995. The historic Potsdamer Platz was not rebuilt as it was divided by the Wall. A must-see for fans of modern city planning. Just to the West of Potsdamer Platz is the Kulturforum, which houses the Gemäldegalerie, and is flanked by the Neue Nationalgalerie and the Philharmonie.
- Hackescher Markt, Spandauer Vorstadt and Scheunenviertel, the home to fashionable culture, with countless small clothing shops, clubs, bars, and galleries. This includes the New Synagogue area in Oranienburger Straße (originally built in the 1860s in Moorish style with a large golden dome and reconstructed in 1993), and the Hackesche Höfe, a conglomeration of several buildings around several courtyards, nicely reconstructed after 1996. This area was a centre of Jewish culture up until the 1930s.
