New Berlin Station to Open

Today's New York Times has an article describing the new terminal station in Berlin.

The article concludes that the station is essentially convenient to "nothing'. It may be a statement with respect to "unification", but certainly not to the city's population center.

Apparently the Zoo station in (West) Berlin will remain, yet the Hauptbanhoff in (East) Berlin will be razed. The Hbf is often shown in History Channel WWII documentaries. I have seen it myself during 1990 and it did not appear that the DDR ever did much to it other than "patch it up' a bit. WWII damage was still quite evident in East Berlin during 1990.

http://www.nytimes.com/2006/03/09/inter ... erlin.html

Here are some blurbs from Archiseek, an online architecture journal.

Apparently, DB modified the design of the new station against the will of the Architect, Meinhard von Gerkan... which is now being settled in court...

http://www.archiseek.com/content/showthread.php?t=4576


Also, here's a note on the "end of the line" for old Berlin Station...

http://www.archiseek.com/content/showthread.php?t=4175

Apparently the masses are unhappy with the idea of Zoo being neglected as it is and potentially being torn down. I would think that DB would want to retain it and turn it into a museum to display some of their antique equipment. But that's a naive preservationist/historian pondering that thought and not a major corporation (government entitty?).


A snippit from the Senate Department of Urban Development...

http://www.stadtentwicklung.berlin.de/b ... fzoo.shtml


And finally, a few words and images from DW (Deutsche Welle, the German news agency)...

http://www.dw-world.de/dw/article/0,214 ... 68,00.html


Enjoy!

the area the train station is in is actually quite central by our new world terms . there would be good public transport provided , but from memory it wouldnt be more than a 15 minute walk from either cities centre .

Gilbert B Norman wrote:Today's New York Times has an article describing the new terminal station in Berlin.

The article concludes that the station is essentially convenient to "nothing'. It may be a statement with respect to "unification", but certainly not to the city's population center.

Apparently the Zoo station in (West) Berlin will remain, yet the Hauptbanhoff in (East) Berlin will be razed. The Hbf is often shown in History Channel WWII documentaries. I have seen it myself during 1990 and it did not appear that the DDR ever did much to it other than "patch it up' a bit. WWII damage was still quite evident in East Berlin during 1990.

http://www.nytimes.com/2006/03/09/inter ... erlin.html

Yes, I remember the old Hauptbahnhof, just after the wall came down. It was very bare. I haven't seen it for some years, but it was essentially a 1930s building. At that time Lichtenberg (with very few facilities) was still the main departure point for north and east of Berlin. I used it for a train to the Sassnitz ferry and Sweden - still an old East German train. The hauptbahnhof was for Dresden Prague and Wien. I think the new main station is on a crossing of north-south and east-west lines, so will genuinely be central for the network. The Zoo station was adequate for the few trains that came from the west in the days of divided Germany, but was inadequate for the modern busier service.

Gilbert B Norman wrote: Today's New York Times has an article describing the new terminal station in Berlin.

It's not a terminal station. It is technically not possible to terminate trains there...

Gilbert B Norman wrote: The article concludes that the station is essentially convenient to "nothing'. It may be a statement with respect to "unification", but certainly not to the city's population center.

It's neare to downtown as Ostbahnhof or Zoologischer Garten. Berlin doesn't have a single population center because the wall.

Gilbert B Norman wrote: Apparently the Zoo station in (West) Berlin will remain, yet the Hauptbanhoff in (East) Berlin will be razed.

No station will be razed! But Zoo station will lose it's long distance train stops. There ist actually no Hauptbahnhof, since 1998 Hauptbahnhof is again Ostbahnhof.

Gilbert B Norman wrote:The Hbf is often shown in History Channel WWII documentaries. I have seen it myself during 1990 and it did not appear that the DDR ever did much to it other than "patch it up' a bit. WWII damage was still quite evident in East Berlin during 1990.

Not correct - the DR (Deutsche Reichsbahn in GDR) began 1985 with a substantial rebuilding including the outline and new building of the station building.

What you have seen was not WWII damage - it was real socialism...

Thomas I wrote:

Gilbert B Norman wrote:The Hbf is often shown in History Channel WWII documentaries. I have seen it myself during 1990 and it did not appear that the DDR ever did much to it other than "patch it up' a bit. WWII damage was still quite evident in East Berlin during 1990.

Not correct - the DR (Deutsche Reichsbahn in GDR) began 1985 with a substantial rebuilding including the outline and new building of the station building.

What you have seen was not WWII damage - it was real socialism...

I remember the Ostbahnhof as having some terminal platforms and some through lines. I think the DDR architects were still stuck in the 1930s as what I experienced was a basically 1930s building. Of course they didn't include much retail as the DDR wasn't a retail kind of state. But the whole industrial and transport set-up was rooted in the 1930s, which was why so much of it had to be closed down after the wall came down.

Of course the good result was that the narrow gauge steam lines survived, for example in Dresden, where I actually saw a standard gauge freight wagon being carried on the narrow gauge line. Now of course there is only a heritage passenger service.

I saw an article some years ago (in "Today's railways") about the new building in Berlin. Is the new station on a crossing point between the old East-West line and a new North-South line? That would make a lot of sense, perhaps restoring the pre-1939 network.

I had a chance to visit the yet-to-be-finished Lehrter Hauptbahnhof in Berlin when I visited in August of 2004 (my German friend and I boarded an S-Bahn train back towards Kreuzberg there). At first glance it looks like another station along the elevated Stadtbahn, but after walking around a bit and looking down, one realizes the scale of the whole thing. In addition to the S-Bahn and regional tracks that run along the Stadtbahn, there is an underground platform area with four or five tracks which run north-south (tunneled under the Tiergarten between the new Hbf and the DB's new underground Potsdamerplatz Bahnhof). Also it will also include what will basically be a shopping mall (a wise move -retail stores in train stations are generally exempt from Germany's strict closing hours). It is a truly impressive project. I recently saw a marketing video put out by DB and will post it here later if I can find it.

george matthews wrote:
I saw an article some years ago (in "Today's railways") about the new building in Berlin. Is the new station on a crossing point between the old East-West line and a new North-South line? That would make a lot of sense, perhaps restoring the pre-1939 network.

Yes it is. The old North-South line for the S-Bahn crosses the East-West line (called "Stadtbahn") at Station Friedrichstraße.

The new North-South-Line is a line for all type of trains except the S-Bahn and connects Station Potsdamer Platz (on the places where the former stations Potsdamer Bahnhof and Anhalter Bahnhof were) with Station Nordkreuz (former Staion Gesundbrunnen) on the inside belt line.

Here is the DB's promo video on the new Hauptbahnhof.

Apparently tonight, Friday, May 26, 2006, there is a celebration for the opening of the new station.
http://www.berlin-online.de
Then search around the topics.
Most of the photos are of the preparation of elevators, etc. What a great use of glass!

bellstbarn wrote:Apparently tonight, Friday, May 26, 2006, there is a celebration for the opening of the new station.
http://www.berlin-online.de
Then search around the topics.
Most of the photos are of the preparation of elevators, etc. What a great use of glass!

Here is a history of the project.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Berlin_Lehrter_Bahnhof
Pictures of the new station.
http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/in_pictures/5017026.stm

I would like to find a track diagram in 3D. There are five layers.

I passed that way in about 1990, shortly after the wall came down. I see that the Stadtbahn station has been demolished because it was in the space of the new station.

Articles in English are beginning to show up on Google News.
Here is one:
http://news.scotsman.com/latest.cfm?id=784702006

Just imagine George W. Bush opening a station for 1,100 trains daily.