Berlin Potsdamer Platz is a railway station in Berlin . It is completely underground and situated under Potsdamer Platz in central Berlin. Regional and S-Bahn services call at the station, and it is also served by U-Bahn line U2 .
127-523: The Center Potsdamer Platz , known as Sony Center until March 2023, is a complex of eight buildings located at the Potsdamer Platz in Berlin , Germany, designed by Helmut Jahn . It opened in 2000 and houses Sony's German headquarters. The cinemas in the center were closed at the end of 2019. In the early 20th century, the site was originally home to Berlin's bustling city center . During World War II , it
254-520: A Legoland Discovery Center . Free Wi-Fi is available. During major sports events like the 2006 FIFA World Cup , it was also home to a large television screen on which the games were shown to viewers sitting in the large open area in the middle. The Sony Center is located near Berlin Potsdamer Platz railway station , which can be accessed on foot. A large, covered shopping center , the Mall of Berlin ,
381-481: A Woolworths store on its ground floor, a major travel company housed on the floor above, and a restaurant offering fine views over the city from the top floor, the economic situation of the time meant that it would not be followed by more buildings in that vein: no further redevelopment in the immediate vicinity of Potsdamer Platz occurred prior to World War II, and so Columbushaus would always seem out of place in that location. Nevertheless, its exact position showed that
508-603: A bakery from which the café was a 1796 offshoot. It had occupied various locations including (from 1812 till 1880), a site in front of the Berlin City Palace , before moving to Potsdamer Platz in the latter year. A major player on the Berlin café scene, Josty attracted writers, artists, politicians and international society: it was one of the places to be seen. The writer Theodor Fontane , painter Adolph von Menzel , and Dadaist Kurt Schwitters were all guests; Karl Liebknecht ,
635-518: A cinema, Cinestar Sony Center, and an IMAX theater in the center. Both were used for screenings in the Berlin International Film Festival until their closure. Architects Murphy/Jahn sought to create a complex where the outside was the "real" city, while inside was a "virtual" city, reinforcing this dichotomy through a series of passages and gates. The design's use of light, both natural and artificial, creates an environment that
762-481: A concert venue until concerns were raised about increased traffic problems in the already congested streets, it was ruled that it should serve a gastronomic purpose only. Altogether it could accommodate 4,000 guests at a time, 1,100 of these in its main hall alone. Many of the total of 14 banquet and beer halls had a Wagnerian theme – indeed, the very name of the complex was taken from the Wagner opera Das Rheingold ,
889-777: A desperate measure to slow the Soviet advance. Because of this incident, the North-South Link was unable to be used until 1947 (see below). Shortly after the war's end, the Ringbahnhof got a reprieve of sorts, temporarily reopening on 6 August 1945 as the terminus of the Wannseebahn trains, while the Nord-Süd-Tunnel received massive repairs (millions of gallons of water had to be pumped out). The Ringbahnhof closed for good on 27 July 1946 after some fragmentary train workings had resumed along
1016-409: A dome rising 35 m above the pavement at the north (Stresemannstrasse) end, it contained the world's largest restaurant – the 2,500-seat Café Piccadilly, plus a 1,200-seat theatre and numerous offices. These included (from 1917 to 1927), the headquarters of Universum Film AG (aka UFA or Ufa), Germany's biggest film company. On 16 August 1914, less than three weeks after the start of World War I ,
1143-433: A few years later. Being outside Berlin, and therefore not subject to the same planning guidelines, Potsdamer Platz grew in a piecemeal and haphazard way, unlike Leipziger Platz, which had been planned and built all at once by Johann Philipp Gerlach . Prussian architect Friedrich David Gilly proposed a unified redesign of the two squares in 1797, but it was never built. In 1815, his pupil, Karl Friedrich Schinkel , proposed
1270-474: A great many buildings in the area, especially Columbushaus, where they took over most of the upper floors. As if to emphasise their presence, they used the building to advertise their own weekly publication: a huge neon sign on its roof proclaimed DIE BRAUNE POST – N.S. SONNTAGSZEITUNG (The Brown Post – N.S. Sunday Newspaper), the N.S. standing for Nationalsozialist (National Socialist), i.e. Nazi. Probably Potsdamer Platz's most prominent landmark in
1397-533: A ground-breaking ceremony taking place on 16 June 1983. Construction started in earnest in December 1983 and the first test runs occurred in June 1984. This required a direct link for those people staying in the western part of Potsdamer Platz as there was no rail connection to Gleisdreieck. Five years of intensive testing followed, not without incident. On 18 April 1987 an arson attack at Gleisdreieck destroyed two cars, while
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#17328524397021524-411: A half years, until its inconvenient site, and the desire to reach other parts of the city, enabled it to be superseded by a better sited new station on an extension of the line to Spittelmarkt . The new station opened first, on 29 September 1907, and the rest of the extension to Spittelmarkt on 1 October 1908 (evidence of the original station's site can still be seen in the tunnel, from passing trains). As
1651-531: A large (some 60 ha (150 acres)), attractive location in the heart of a major European capital city had suddenly become available. As part of a redevelopment effort for the area, the space was to be developed. In 1992, Sony acquired the 30,000-square-meter (320,000 sq ft) site from the Berlin city government for 97.2 million German marks, about US$ 61.6 million. Shortly after, the European Commission briefly investigated whether Sony paid less than
1778-470: A more spectacular mishap occurred on 19 December 1988 when a train with badly adjusted brakes ran through the end wall of the Kemperplatz terminus, much to the amusement of the local press. However, with some spare cars pressed into service, the line, just 1.6 km (0.99 mi) in length, was opened to the public on 28 August 1989, although it did not really run from anywhere to anywhere. Nevertheless, it
1905-531: A new name, Pschorr-Haus . At 8.00 p.m. on 29 October 1923, Germany's first radio broadcast was made from a building ( Vox-Haus ) close by in Potsdamer Strasse. Standing alongside the Weinhaus Rheingold's Potsdamer Strasse entrance, this five-storey steel-framed edifice had been erected as an office building in 1907-8 by architect and one-time Berlin inspector of buildings Otto Stahn (1859–1930), who
2032-483: A number of different names including Conditorei Friediger , Café Wiener , Engelhardt Brau and Kaffee Potsdamer Platz (sometimes appearing to have two or more names simultaneously), before its eventual destruction in World War II . Among the many beer palaces around Potsdamer Platz were two in particular which contained an extensive range of rooms and halls covering a large area. The Alt-Bayern in Potsdamer Strasse
2159-429: A replica of the tower was erected, just for show, close to its original location by Siemens, to celebrate the company's 150th anniversary. The replica was moved again on 29 September 2000, to the place where it stands today. The traffic problems that had blighted Potsdamer Platz for decades continued to be a big headache, despite the new lights, and these led to a strong desire to solve them once and for all. By now Berlin
2286-698: A room that came to be named after him – the Kaisersaal . The other was the Hotel Excelsior , also 600 rooms but superior provision of other facilities made it the largest hotel in Continental Europe, located in Stresemannstrasse opposite the Anhalter Bahnhof and connected to it by a 100-metre-long subterranean passageway complete with a parade of underground shops. Two other hotels which shared
2413-485: A row of new single-storey shops was erected along Potsdamer Straße. Out on the streets, even the flower-sellers, for whom the area had once been renowned, were doing brisk business again. The area around Potsdamer Platz had also become a focus for black market trading. Since the American, British and Soviet Occupation Zones converged there, people theoretically only had to walk a few paces across sector boundaries to avoid
2540-481: A sort to resume. The U-Bahn and S-Bahn were partially operational again from 2 June 1946, fully from 16 November 1947 (although repairs were not completed until May 1948) and trams by 1952. Part of the Haus Vaterland reopened in 1948 in a much simplified form. The new East German state-owned retail business H.O. ( Handelsorganisation , meaning Trading Organisation), had seized almost all of Wertheim's former assets in
2667-428: A star-shaped intersection deemed the transport hub of the entire continent. These were: As well as the stations and other facilities and attractions already mentioned, in the immediate area was one of the world's biggest and most luxurious department stores: Wertheim . Founded by German merchant Georg Wertheim (1857–1939), designed by architect Alfred Messel (1853–1909), opened in 1897 and extended several times over
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#17328524397022794-479: A summer garden, winter garden and roof garden, an enormous restaurant and several smaller eating areas, its own laundry, a theater and concert booking office, its own bank, whose strongrooms were underground at the eastern end of the building, and a large fleet of private delivery vehicles. In the run-up to Christmas Wertheim was transformed into a fairytale kingdom, and was well known to children from all over Germany and far beyond. In Stresemannstrasse, and paralleling
2921-596: A terminus of its own at Kemper Platz , very near the Philharmonie (Philharmonic Hall, home of the Berlin Philharmonic Orchestra ). As early as the late 1970s the West Berlin government had discussed introducing such a system to the city, particularly a section linking Tegel Airport with the centre. The go-ahead was finally given for the building of a test track at Potsdamer Platz on 2 December 1980, with
3048-517: A time. The Café Vaterland had remained largely untouched, but the 1,200-seat theatre was now a 1,400-seat cinema. The rest of the building had been turned into a large number of theme restaurants, all served from a central kitchen containing the largest gas-fueled cooking plant in Europe. These included: Rheinterrasse, Löwenbräu ( Bavarian beer restaurant), Grinzing ( Viennese café and wine bar), Bodega (Spanish winery), Csarda (Hungarian), Wild West Bar (aka
3175-675: A very large government presence, with many German imperial departments, Prussian state authorities and their various sub-departments, came into the area, taking over 26 former palaces and aristocratic mansions in Leipziger Platz, Leipziger Strasse and Wilhelmstraße. Even the Reichstag itself, the German Parliament , occupied the former home of the family of composer Felix Mendelssohn (1809–47) in Leipziger Strasse before moving in 1894 to
3302-467: A wedge-shaped structure located in the angle between Potsdamer Strasse and Linkstrasse (literally "Left Street"), and with entrances in both streets. Wine merchant Friedrich Karl Christian Huth, whose great-grandfather had been kellermeister (cellar-master) to King Friedrich II back in 1769, had founded the firm in 1871 and taken over the former building in Potsdamer Straße on 23 March 1877. His son,
3429-402: A wine restaurant on the ground floor, and wine storage space above, so it had to take a lot of weight. It was thus given a strong steel skeleton, which would stand the building in very good stead some three decades after its completion. Famous for its fine claret, numerous members of European society were made welcome there as guests. A total of 15 chefs were employed there, and Alois Hitler Jr.,
3556-701: Is "luminous, not illuminated." When the building opened, the Chicago Tribune wrote: "Jahn's design for the Sony Center bears a superficial resemblance to the dizzying atrium of his James R. Thompson Center in Chicago's Loop because its buildings wrap around a big public space. But unlike the Thompson Center, the Sony Center's public space, called the Forum, has an umbrella-like roof of steel, glass and fabric partly open to
3683-419: Is nearby, as are many hotels, Deutsche Bahn central offices, along with an office building that is home to the fastest elevator in Europe. 52°30′36″N 13°22′25″E / 52.51000°N 13.37361°E / 52.51000; 13.37361 Potsdamer Platz Potsdamer Platz ( German: [ˈpɔtsdamɐ plats] , Potsdam Square ) is a public square and traffic intersection in
3810-566: The Welthauptstadt (World Capital) Germania , to be realised by his architect friend Albert Speer (1905–81). Under these plans the immediate vicinity of Potsdamer Platz would have got off fairly lightly, although the Potsdamer Bahnhof (and the Anhalter Bahnhof a short distance away) would have lost their function. The new North-South Axis , the linchpin of the scheme, would have severed their approach tracks, leaving both termini stranded on
3937-528: The Anhalter Bahnhof was the Berlin terminus of a line running as far as Jüterbog and extended to Dessau , Kothen and beyond. Both termini began life modestly, but to cope with increasing demand, both went on to much bigger and better things, a new Potsdamer Bahnhof, destined to be Berlin's busiest station, opening on 30 August 1872 and a new Anhalter Bahnhof, destined to be the city's biggest and finest, on 15 June 1880. This latter station benefitted from
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4064-487: The Arizona Bar) (American), Osteria (Italian), Kombüse ( Bremen drinking den – literally "galley"), Rübchen ( Teltow , named after the well-known turnip dish Teltower Rübchen , made with turnips grown locally in the small town of Teltow just outside Berlin), plus a Turkish café and Japanese tearoom; additionally there was a large ballroom. Up to eight orchestras and dance bands regularly performed in different parts of
4191-617: The Berlin Olympic Games in 1936 meant vital safety measures were ignored: on 20 August 1935, a tunnel collapse just south of the Brandenburg Gate buried 23 workmen of whom only four survived; then on 28 December 1936, a fire near the Potsdamer Platz station destroyed vital equipment. Needless to say, the line was not ready for the Berlin Olympics; in fact it was another three years before it first saw public use. In spite of all
4318-666: The Berliner Verkehrsbetriebe (Berlin Transport Services) company. At the Potsdamer Platz up to 11 policemen at a time had tried to control all this traffic but with varying success. The delays in tram traffic increased and the job was very dangerous for the policemen. The Berliner Straßenbahn-Betriebs-GmbH started researches to control the traffic on the main streets and places in 1924. Berlin traffic experts visited colleagues in Paris, London and New York. They had to organize
4445-615: The Spartacus Communist movement leader read a lot here and even made some key political speeches from the pavement terrace, while author Erich Kästner wrote part of his 1929 bestseller for children, Emil und die Detektive ( Emil and the Detectives ), on the same terrace and made the café the setting for an important scene in the book. Despite the prestige associated with its name, Café Josty closed in 1930. It then went through an odyssey of re-openings, closures and relaunches under
4572-518: The Thirty Years' War (1618–48). Several new districts were founded around the city's perimeter, just outside the old fortifications. The largest of these was Friedrichstadt , just south west of the historic core of Berlin, begun in 1688 and named after the new elector, Frederick William III, who became King Frederick I of Prussia . Its street layout followed the Baroque -style grid pattern much favoured at
4699-607: The Café Piccadilly was given a new name – the more patriotic-sounding Café Vaterland. However, in 1927–8 the architect and entrepreneur Carl Stahl-Urach (1879–1933) transformed the whole building into a gastronomic fantasy land, financed and further elaborated upon by new owners the Kempinski organisation. It reopened on 31 August 1928 as the Haus Vaterland, offering "The World in One House," and could now hold up to 8,000 guests at
4826-602: The Grand Hotel Belle Vue, on the corner of Bellevuestrasse and Königgrätzer Strasse, thus enabling one revolutionary new building to struggle through to reality despite considerable financial odds. Columbushaus was the result of a plan by the French retail company Galeries Lafayette , whose flagship store was the legendary Galeries Lafayette in Paris, to open a counterpart in Berlin, on the Grand Hotel Belle Vue's former site, but financial worries made them pull out. Undaunted,
4953-574: The Huguenots fleeing religious persecution in France, and their descendants, had also been living around the trading post and cultivating local fields. Noticing that traffic queues often built up at the Potsdam Gate due to delays in making the customs checks, these people had begun to offer coffee, bread, cakes and confectionery from their homes or from roadside stalls to travelers passing through, thus beginning
5080-455: The Nazi government. When the city was divided into sectors by the occupying Allies at the end of the war, the square found itself on the boundary between the American, British and Soviet sectors. Despite all the devastation, commercial life reappeared in the ruins around Potsdamer Platz within just a few weeks of war's end. The lower floors of a few buildings were patched up enough to allow business of
5207-429: The North-South Link on 2 June. Full services recommenced on 16 November 1947, although repairs were not complete until May 1948. The North-South Link saw a more bizarre - though not unique - state of affairs. This line, plus two U-Bahn lines elsewhere in the city, suffered from a quirk of geography in that they briefly passed through East German territory en route from one part of West Berlin to another. This gave rise to
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5334-516: The Potsdamer Bahnhof has not been documented. Meanwhile, the North-South Axis would have cut a giant swathe passing just to the west of Potsdamer Platz, some 5 km long and up to 100 m wide, and lined with Nazi government edifices on a gargantuan scale. The eastern half of the former Millionaires' Quarter, including Stüler's Matthiaskirche, would have been totally eradicated. New U-Bahn and S-Bahn lines were planned to run directly beneath almost
5461-588: The Potsdamer Bahnhof on its eastern side, was another great magnet for shoppers and tourists alike – a huge multi-national-themed eating establishment: the Haus Vaterland . Designed by architect Franz Heinrich Schwechten (1841–1924), who was also responsible for the Anhalter Bahnhof and the Kaiser Wilhelm Memorial Church , it was erected in 1911–12 as the Haus Potsdam. 93 m in length and with
5588-537: The Sony Center for less than 600 million euros to a group of German and US investment funds, including investment bank Morgan Stanley , Corpus Sireo and an affiliate of The John Buck Company . The group sold the Sony Center to the National Pension Service of South Korea for 570 million euros in 2010. In 2017, Oxford Properties and Madison International Realty acquired the complex for close to 1.1 billion euros. From 1999 until 2019, CineStar operated
5715-517: The Soviets from making unauthorised incursions into the American and British zones. These measures were only partially successful: after further skirmishes in which shots were fired, barbed wire entanglements were stretched across some roads, a foretaste of things to come. Berlin Potsdamer Platz railway station The first station at Potsdamer Platz was the Potsdamer Bahnhof terminus , which
5842-605: The Tiergarten, a large wooded park formerly the Royal Hunting Grounds, gave his name to Lennéstraße , a thoroughfare forming part of the southern boundary of the park very close to Potsdamer Platz, and transformed a muddy ditch to the south into one of Berlin's busiest waterways, the Landwehrkanal . Meanwhile, country peasantry were generally not welcome in the city, and so the gates also served to restrict access. However,
5969-451: The Tiergarten. The development was piecemeal, but in 1828 this area just to the west of Potsdamer Platz, sandwiched between the Tiergarten and the north bank of the future Landwehrkanal, received royal approval for a more purposeful metamorphosis into a residential colony of the affluent, gradually filling with palatial houses and villas. These became the homes of civil servants, officers, bankers, artists and politicians among others, and earned
6096-430: The actual Potsdamer Platz station was rather poorly sited. Though it was reached via an entrance right outside the main-line terminus, people then had to walk about 200 metres (660 ft) along an underground passage beneath the appropriately named Bahnstraße (Railway Street). It was built by Swedish architect Grenander in 1902, and it was supposed to be named Potsdamer Bahnhof, or Potsdamer Ringbahnhof, but after 5 years
6223-414: The architect, Erich Mendelsohn (1887–1953), erected vast advertising boards around the perimeter of the site, and the revenue generated by these enabled him to proceed with the development anyway. Columbushaus was a ten-storey ultra-modern office building, years ahead of its time, containing Germany's first artificial ventilation system, and whose elegance and clean lines won it much praise. However, despite
6350-490: The area as the location for a National Memorial Cathedral, to be known as the Residenzkirche , but this was never built either, due to lack of funds. However, Schinkel did get to rebuild the gate in 1823–1824, replacing what was little more than a gap in the customs wall with a much grander affair consisting of two matching Doric-style stone gate-houses, like little temples, facing each other across Leipziger Strasse. The one on
6477-559: The area the nickname "Millionaires' Quarter" although its official designation was Friedrichvorstadt (Friedrich's Suburb), or the Tiergartenviertel (Tiergarten Quarter). Many of the properties in the neighborhood were the work of architect Georg Friedrich Heinrich Hitzig (1811–81), a pupil of Schinkel who also built the original "English Embassy" in Leipziger Platz, where the vast Wertheim department store would stand, although Friedrichvorstadt's focal point and most notable building
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#17328524397026604-489: The beginnings of the Runden Platz (Round Platz), a huge circular public space at the point where the North-South Axis and Potsdamer Straße intersected. Additionally, the southern edge of the Tiergarten was to be redefined, with a new road planned to slice through the built-up area immediately to the north of Columbushaus (although Columbushaus itself would remain unscathed); this road would line up with Voßstraße , one block to
6731-657: The border and then reverse back. This was partly the case with the U-Bahn line through Potsdamer Platz, as in October 1991, the Mohrenstraße station operationally became a terminus for trains on the eastern side. On the western side however, the entire section all the way back to Wittenbergplatz was closed completely and at least partially dismantled. Indeed, two of the abandoned stations on this section, Bülowstraße and Nollendorfplatz , were converted into markets. The antiques market at
6858-483: The building, plus a host of singers, dancers and other entertainers. It should be pointed out here though that not all of these attractions existed simultaneously, owing to changes in those countries that Germany was or was not allied to, in the volatile years leading up to and during World War II , a good example being the closure of the Wild West Bar following America's entry into the war as an enemy of Germany. Among
6985-509: The busiest traffic center in all of Europe, and the heart of Berlin's nightlife . It had acquired an iconic status, on a par with Piccadilly Circus in London or Times Square in New York. It was a key location that helped to symbolize Berlin; it was known worldwide, and a legend grew up around it. It represented the geographical center of the city, the meeting place of five of its busiest streets in
7112-585: The center of Berlin , Germany, lying about 1 km (1,100 yd) south of the Brandenburg Gate and the Reichstag ( German Parliament Building), and close to the southeast corner of the Tiergarten park. It is named after the city of Potsdam , some 25 km (16 mi) to the south west, and marks the point where the old road from Potsdam passed through the city wall of Berlin at the Potsdam Gate . Initially,
7239-421: The city authorities would not allow the new line to breach the customs wall, still standing at the time, it had to stop just short, at Potsdamer Platz, but it was this that kick-started the real transformation of the area, into the bustling focal point that Potsdamer Platz became. Three years later a second railway terminus opened. Six hundred meters to the southeast, with a front facade facing Askanischer Platz ,
7366-609: The city became the capital of the new German Empire on 18 January 1871. Potsdamer Platz and neighbouring Leipziger Platz came into their own afterward. Now firmly in the centre of a metropolis whose population eventually reached 4.4 million, making it the third largest city in the world after London and New York, the area was ready to take on its most celebrated role. Vast hotels and department stores, hundreds of smaller shops, theatres, dance-halls, cafés, restaurants, bars, beer palaces, wine-houses and clubs, all started to appear. Some of these places became internationally known. Also,
7493-514: The closure of a short-lived third terminus in the area – the Dresdner Bahnhof , located south of the Landwehrkanal, which lasted from 17 June 1875 until 15 October 1882. A railway line once ran through Potsdamer Platz: a connecting line opened in October 1851 and running around the city just inside the customs wall, crossing numerous streets and squares at street level, and whose purpose
7620-405: The country folk were permitted to set up trading posts of their own just outside the gates, and the Potsdam Gate especially. It was hoped that this would encourage development of all the country lanes into proper roads; in turn it was hoped that these would emulate Parisian boulevards—broad, straight and magnificent, but the main intention was to enable troops to be moved quickly. Thus Potsdamer Platz
7747-460: The customs wall redundant, and so in 1866–7 most of it was demolished along with all the city gates except two – the Brandenburg Gate and the Potsdam Gate. The removal of the customs wall allowed its former route to be turned into yet another road running through Potsdamer Platz, thus increasing still further the amount of traffic passing through. This road, both north and south of the platz,
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#17328524397027874-453: The early 1930s there were so many diplomats living and working in the area that it came to be redesignated the "Diplomatic Quarter". By 1938, 37 out of 52 embassies and legations in Berlin, and 28 out of 29 consulates, were situated here. The first traffic light tower in Germany was erected at Potsdamer Platz on 20 October 1924 and went into service on 15. December 1924 in an attempt to control
8001-484: The elements, with a cone-shaped, 30-foot-wide opening in its center." Hochtief was the general contractor; Jaros, Baum & Bolles provided MEP engineering; and the structural engineering consultants were BGS Ingenieursozietät and Ove Arup & Partners . The Sony Center contains a mix of shops, restaurants, a conference center , hotel rooms, around 67 residential units, offices, the Museum of Film and Television , and
8128-540: The end of 2005, half a year before the planned opening of Berlin Hauptbahnhof. The station was finally opened on May 28, 2006. After upgrades on the Berlin Dresden railway , the airport express (FEX) is to run via Potsdamer Platz. The planned rebuild of the trunk line will reconnect Potsdamer Platz with Potsdam . The station is served by the following services: The long-distance station is, strictly speaking, not
8255-545: The entrance to Leipziger Platz (the Potsdam Gate), was the 400-room Hotel Fürstenhof , by Richard Bielenberg (1871–1929) and Josef Moser (1872–1963), erected in 1906–1907, also on the site of an earlier building. With its 200-metre-long main facade along Stresemannstrasse, the Fürstenhof was less opulent than some of the other hotels mentioned, despite its size, but was still popular with business people. The new U-Bahn station
8382-428: The event, a substantial amount of demolition did take place in Potsdamer Straße, between the platz itself and the Landwehrkanal, and this became the location of the one Germania building that actually went forward to a state of virtual completion: architect Theodor Dierksmeier 's Haus des Fremdenverkehrs (House of Tourism), basically a giant state-run travel agency . More significantly, its curving eastern facade marked
8509-532: The first of the four parts of the cycle Der Ring des Nibelungen , although this name did hark back to the building's planned former role as a concert venue. Another building by the same architect but which still stands – the "Rosengarten" in Mannheim , has a remarkably similar main facade. Finally, on the corner between Potsdamer Strasse and the Potsdamer Bahnhof, stood Bierhaus Siechen , built by Johann Emil Schaudt (1874–1957), opened in 1910 and relaunched under
8636-423: The following 40 years, it ultimately possessed a floor area double that of the Reichstag, a 330-metre-long granite and plate glass facade along Leipziger Strasse, 83 elevators , three escalators , 1,000 telephones , 10,000 lamps, five kilometers of pneumatic tubing for moving items from the various departments to the packing area, and a separate entrance directly from the nearby U-Bahn station. It also contained
8763-630: The height of the Kingdom of Prussia . Initially known as the Achteck (Octagon), on 15 September 1814 it was renamed Leipziger Platz after the site of Prussia's final decisive defeat of Napoleon Bonaparte at the Battle of Leipzig , which brought to an end the Wars of Liberation that had been going on since 1806. The gate itself was redesignated Leipziger Tor (Leipzig Gate) around the same time, but reverted to its old name
8890-408: The infamous "Geisterbahnhöfe" ( ghost stations ), Potsdamer Platz being the most notorious, which were sealed off from the outside world and trains ran straight through without stopping. They would generally slow down, however, affording passengers the strange sight of dusty, dimly lit platforms patrolled by armed guards, there to prevent any East Berliners from trying to escape to the West by train. At
9017-424: The late 1920s and early 1930s, especially around 1928–9, when the creative fervour was at its peak. On the cards was an almost total redevelopment of the area. One design submitted by Wagner himself comprised an array of gleaming new buildings arranged around a vast multi-level system of fly-overs and underpasses, with a huge glass-roofed circular car-park in the middle. Unfortunately the worldwide Great Depression of
9144-502: The latter was housed in sixteen old wooden coaches lined up beside the platforms, while another coach even carried passengers back and forth to Bülowstraße where a Turkish bazaar was sited. This station was intended to be an interchange with the future driverless line U3 and U10 , but the plans were scrapped when the U3 gained much of its current route in December 2004. It was partially converted into space for events and exhibitions in 2006. In
9271-515: The latter years of the Wall's existence, part of the abandoned U-Bahn section, the stretch between Gleisdreieck and Potsdamer Platz, was used by the M-Bahn (Magnetic Levitation Railway). Instead of diving underground as before, once it crossed over the Landwehrkanal, it remained above ground on a lengthy elevated structure supported on steel columns which curved across the Potsdamer Bahnhof's former site to end at
9398-521: The line itself being extended north and east on 1 October 1908. In 1939 the S-Bahn followed, its North-South Link between Unter den Linden and Yorckstraße opening in stages during the year, the Potsdamer Platz S-Bahn station itself opening on 15 April. By the second half of the 19th century, Berlin had been growing at a tremendous rate for some time, but its growth accelerated even faster after
9525-442: The location of his palace, in 1660. After Frederick II became king in 1740, the road was significantly improved, and became known as Potsdamer Straße ; the gate became Potsdamer Tor (Potsdam Gate). Just inside the gate was a large octagonal area, created at the time of Friedrichstadt's expansion in 1732-4 and bisected by Leipziger Strasse; this was one of several parade grounds for the thousands of soldiers garrisoned in Berlin at
9652-465: The major hotels at or near Potsdamer Platz were two designed by the same architect, Otto Rehnig (1864–1925), and opened in the same year, 1908. One was the 600-room Hotel Esplanade (sometimes known as the "Grand Hotel Esplanade"), in Bellevuestrasse. Charlie Chaplin and Greta Garbo were guests there, and Kaiser Wilhelm II himself held regular "gentlemen's evenings" and other functions there in
9779-470: The major stations, allowed the connecting line to be scrapped in 1871, although the Ringbahn itself was not complete and open for all traffic until 15 November 1877. Potsdamer Platz was served by both of Berlin's two local rail systems. The U-Bahn arrived first, from the south; begun on 10 September 1896, it opened on 18 February 1902, with a new and better sited station being provided on 29 September 1907, and
9906-458: The market price. Over the following years, a total of eight buildings were designed by Helmut Jahn and Peter Walker as landscape architect, and construction was completed in 2000 at a total cost of 750 million euros. The iconic 4,000 m (43,000 sq ft) vaulted roof covering the central open area between the main buildings was engineered and built by Waagner-Biro using steel, glass and translucent fabric. In February 2008 Sony sold
10033-588: The mid-1930s, the sign first appears in photographs dated 1935 but was gone again by 1938. On an even darker note, those Nazi concerns included the Gestapo , who set up a secret prison in an upper part of the building, complete with interrogation and torture rooms. Meanwhile, in another part of the building, the Information Office of the Olympic Games Organising Committee was housed. Here much of
10160-525: The new station lay mostly beneath the adjoining Leipziger Platz , this is what the station was initially called, being renamed Potsdamer Platz on 29 January 1923. The station was one of a number designed by the Swedish architect Alfred Frederik Elias Grenander (1863–1931). From a technical point of view, its construction was something of a challenge, as aboveground the Hotel Furstenhof was being rebuilt at
10287-549: The newly created German Democratic Republic but, unable to start up the giant Leipziger Platz store again (it was too badly damaged), it opened a new Kaufhaus (department store) on the ground floor of Columbushaus. An office of the Kasernierte Volkspolizei (literally "Barracked People's Police") – the military precursor of the Nationale Volksarmee (National People's Army), occupied the floor above. Meanwhile,
10414-536: The next street ( Prinz-Albrecht-Straße ), also by Colditz, that had been built for the Preußischer Landtag (the Prussian Lower House), in 1892–9. Potsdamer Platz was also the location of Germany's first electric street lights , installed in 1882 by the electrical giant Siemens , founded and based in the city. The heyday of Potsdamer Platz was in the 1920s and 1930s. By this time it had developed into
10541-399: The north of Leipziger Platz. Here Albert Speer erected Hitler's enormous new Reichskanzlei building, and yet even this was little more than a dry run for an even larger structure some distance further away. Meanwhile, the Nazi influence was no less evident at Potsdamer Platz than anywhere else in Berlin. As well as swastika flags and propaganda everywhere, Nazi-affiliated concerns occupied
10668-421: The north side served as the customs house and excise collection point, while its southern counterpart was a military guardhouse, set up to prevent desertions of Prussian soldiers , which had become a major problem. The new gate was dedicated on 23 August 1824. Schinkel's proposal to add a garden was not implemented, but in 1828 a plan by gardener and landscape architect Peter Joseph Lenné went ahead. He redesigned
10795-580: The north–south line built as part of the Berlin Hauptbahnhof Project, was opened in 2006. This station is on the four-track north–south connection of long-distance and regional traffic between the stations Hauptbahnhof and Südkreuz. The station is 260 meters long, 50 meters wide and (at track level) 20 meters below street level, has two island platforms on the four tracks. Regional Express trains on lines RE 3, RE 4 and RE 5 currently stop at Potsdamer Platz regional station. Traffic forecasts before
10922-550: The number of lines had soared to 35 by 1908 and ultimately reached 40, carrying between them 600 trams every hour, day and night. Services were run by a large number of companies. After 1918 most of the tram companies joined. In 1923, at the peak of the Hyperinflation the tram traffic was stopped for two days and a new communal company called Berliner Straßenbahn-Betriebs-GmbH was founded. Finally in 1929 all communal traffic companies (Underground, Tram and Buses) were unified into
11049-533: The open area near the city gate was used for military drills and parades. In the 19th into the 20th century, it developed from an intersection of suburban thoroughfares into the most bustling traffic intersection in Europe. The area was totally destroyed during World War II and then left desolate during the Cold War era when the Berlin Wall bisected its location. Since German reunification , Potsdamer Platz has been
11176-405: The opening assumed 80,000 passengers per day, including 50,000 exiting or entering and around 30,000 people transferring to the underground and S-Bahn. Construction work was to begin in 1995. Completion of the shell was planned for spring 1997, and the interior work was to follow between 1997 and 1999. The opening of the station was planned for 2002. By mid-2002 it was planned to open the station at
11303-453: The other two were originally intended to be utilised by another new line, which was to branch off eastwards and run under the city to Görlitzer Bahnhof . A connection from Anhalter Bahnhof was also to be made. Although construction of some tunnel sections went ahead (and these still exist, though are inaccessible to the public), the line was never opened. During the war, many sections of the U-Bahn and S-Bahn were closed due to enemy action, and
11430-489: The planning of the 1936 Berlin Summer Olympic Games took place. As was the case in most of central Berlin, almost all of the buildings around Potsdamer Platz were turned to rubble by air raids and heavy artillery bombardment during the last years of World War II. The three most destructive raids (out of 363 that the city suffered), occurred on 23 November 1943, and 3 and 26 February 1945. Things were not helped by
11557-550: The platz was starting to be opened out: the former hotel had mostly stood on a large flagged area laid out in front of it, indicating that the new building curved away from the existing street line; this would have enabled future street widening to take place. Columbushaus was completed and opened in January 1933, the same month that the Nazi dictator Adolf Hitler (1889–1945) came to power. Hitler had big plans for Berlin, to transform it into
11684-588: The points where the lines passed directly beneath the actual border, concrete "collars" were constructed within the tunnels with just the minimum clearance for trains, to prevent people from clinging to the sides or roof of the coaches. The station was the last to be reopened, with major refurbishment work included to the entire North South line and the station, with re-coating/repainting of the station and huge removal of wartime flood damage, on 3 March 1992. Major refurbishment began to be carried out in January 1991. The U-Bahn , or Untergrundbahn (underground railway),
11811-599: The respective police officials. Meanwhile, friction between the Western Allies and Soviets was steadily rising. The Soviets even took to marking out their border by stationing armed soldiers along it at intervals of a few metres, day and night, in all weathers. Since there was not, as yet, a fixed marker, the borders were prone to abuse, which eventually resulted (in August 1948), in white lines in luminous paint appearing across roads and even through ruined buildings to try to deter
11938-473: The same architect, in this case Ludwig Heim (1844–1917), were the 68-room Hotel Bellevue (sometimes known as the "Grand Hotel Bellevue"), built 1887–8, and the 110-room Palast Hotel , built 1892–3 on the site of an earlier hotel. These stood on either side of the northern exit from Potsdamer Platz along Ebertstraße. The Bellevue was well known for its Winter Garden. Meanwhile, facing the Palast Hotel across
12065-406: The same time. The U-Bahn line extension and new station ran right through the hotel's basement, cutting it in half. Contrary to several sources, the hotel did not however enjoy a separate entrance directly from the station. The enormous Wertheim Department Store in nearby Leipziger Straße did enjoy such an entrance, as in later years did the Hotel Excelsior from the Anhalter Bahnhof. Until 1923
12192-479: The sections through Potsdamer Platz were no exception. The North-South Link, less than six years old, became the setting for one of the most contentious episodes of the final Battle for Berlin , in late April and early May 1945. On 2 May, the tunnel was flooded as a consequence of the decision of the remaining Nazi leaders to blow up the section of the North-South Tunnel beneath the nearby Landwehrkanal as
12319-455: The setbacks, it was opened from Unter den Linden to Potsdamer Platz on 15 April 1939, extended to Anhalter Bahnhof on 9 October, and then to Yorckstraße, to complete the link, on 6 November. The Potsdamer Platz S-Bahn station also contained an underground shopping arcade, the largest in Europe . Four platforms were provided at the station, and all were used although just two were planned to suffice:
12446-466: The sheer volume of traffic passing through. This traffic had grown to extraordinary levels. Even in 1900, more than 100,000 people, 20,000 cars, horse-drawn vehicles and handcarts, plus many thousands of bicycles, passed through the platz daily. By the 1920s the number of cars had soared to 60,000. The trams added greatly to this. The first four lines had appeared in 1880, rising to 13 by 1897, all horse-drawn, but after electrification between 1898 and 1902
12573-465: The site of major redevelopment projects. The history of Potsdamer Platz can be traced to 29 October 1685, when the Tolerance Edict of Potsdam was signed, whereby Frederick William , Elector of Brandenburg-Prussia from 1640 to 1688, allowed large numbers of religious refugees, including Jews from Austria and Huguenots expelled from France, to settle on his territory to repopulate it following
12700-404: The station was known as Leipziger Platz. From then the name was Potsdamer Platz. The station was closed from 13 August 1961 to 13 November 1993 when Berlin was separated by Berlin Wall . A border fortification was placed near Potsdamer Platz station. This border fortification was removed in December 1990. It was imagined that trains on either side would simply run as far as the last stop before
12827-498: The station was relocated 180m to the southwest at Leipziger Platz. Later that year, the system was developed into a through line running from Warschauer Brücke to Knie , which actually placed Potsdamer Platz on a branch accessed via a triangle of lines ( Gleisdreieck ) between the Möckernbrücke and Bülowstraße stations near the current Gleisdreieck station . The first Potsdamer Platz U-Bahn station saw use for just over five and
12954-625: The stepbrother of the future Nazi dictator Adolf Hitler , was a waiter there in the 1920s, before he opened his own restaurant and hotel at Wittenbergplatz , in the western part of the city. Café Josty was one of two rival cafés (the other being the Astoria , later Café Eins A ), occupying the broad corner between Potsdamer Strasse and Bellevuestrasse. The Josty company had been founded in 1793 by two Swiss brothers, Johann and Daniel Josty, who had emigrated to Berlin from Sils in Switzerland and set up
13081-496: The time, and was based on two main axes: Friedrichstraße running north–south, and Leipziger Strasse running east–west. All the new suburbs were absorbed into Berlin around 1709–10. In 1721-3 a south-westwards expansion of Friedrichstadt was planned under the orders of King Frederick William I , and this was completed in 1732-4 by architect Philipp Gerlach (1679–1748). In this expansion, a new north–south axis emerged: Wilhelmstrasse . In 1735–1737, after Friedrichstadt's expansion
13208-464: The time, triggered by the Wall Street Crash of 1929 , meant that most of the plans remained on the drawing board. However, in Germany this depression was virtually a continuation of an economic morass that had blighted the country since the end of World War I , partly the result of the war reparations the country had been made to pay, and this morass had brought about the closure and demolition of
13335-404: The tower cabin. A solitary policeman sat in a small cabin at the top of the tower and switched the lights around manually, until they were automated in 1926. Yet some officers still remained on the ground in case people did not pay any attention to the lights. The tower remained until October 1937, when it was removed to allow for excavations for the new S-Bahn underground line. On 26 September 1997,
13462-514: The track and the elevated steel deck between September 1991 and January 1992 to make way for the U2 to be reinstated. Today there is nothing left to show that it ever existed. Similarly it was decided not to proceed with any M-Bahn plans elsewhere in the city. The possibility of going ahead with the line to Tegel Airport resurfaced periodically, but since the airport itself closed in 2020, these plans have been consigned to history. A regional rail station on
13589-434: The tradition of providing food and drink around the future Potsdamer Platz. Larger and more purpose-built establishments began to take their place, and they in turn were superseded by bigger and grander ones. The former district of quiet villas was by now anything but quiet: Potsdamer Platz had taken on an existence all its own whose sheer pace of life rivalled anything within the city. By the mid-1860s direct taxation had made
13716-425: The traffic, define traffic rules and select a solution to control the traffic. In New York, Fifth Avenue they found traffic light towers designed by Joseph H. Freedlander in 1922 which can be regarded as a model for the Berlin tower. The Potsdamer Platz five-sided 8.5 m high traffic tower was designed by Jean Kramer , a German architect. The traffic lights were delivered by Siemens & Halske and mounted on top of
13843-631: The vast new edifice near the Brandenburg Gate, erected by Paul Wallot (1841–1912). Next door, the Herrenhaus, or Prussian House of Lords (the Upper House of the Prussian State Parliament), occupied a former porcelain factory for a while, before moving to an impressive new building erected on the site of the former Mendelssohn family home in 1899–1904 by Friedrich Schulze Colditz (1843–1912). This building backed on to an equally grand edifice in
13970-543: The very close proximity of Hitler's Reich Chancellery, just one block away in Voßstraße, and many other Nazi government edifices nearby as well, and so Potsdamer Platz was right in a major target area. Once the bombing and shelling had largely ceased, the ground invasion began as Soviet forces stormed the centre of Berlin street by street, building by building, aiming to capture the Reich Chancellery and other key symbols of
14097-520: The whole length of the axis, and the city's entire underground network reoriented to gravitate towards this new hub (at least one tunnel section, around 220 metres in length, was actually constructed and still exists today, buried some 20 metres beneath the Tiergarten, despite having never seen a train). This was in addition to the S-Bahn North-South Link beneath Potsdamer Platz itself, which went forward to completion, opening in stages in 1939. In
14224-404: The wine wholesale dealer William ("Willy") Huth (1877–1967), took over the business in 1904 and, a few years later, commissioned the replacement of the building by a new one on the same site. Running right through the block into Linkstrasse, this new Weinhaus Huth was designed by the architects Conrad Heidenreich (1873–1937) and Paul Michel (1877–1938), and opened on 2 October 1912, and contained
14351-407: The wrong side of it. All trains arriving in Berlin would have run into either of two vast new stations located on the Ringbahn to the north and south of the centre respectively, to be known as Nordbahnhof (North Station) and Südbahnhof (South Station), located at Wedding and Südkreuz . In Speer's plan the former Anhalter Bahnhof was earmarked to become a public swimming pool; the intended fate of
14478-410: Was a major centre of innovation in many different fields including architecture. In addition, the city's colossal pace of change (compared by some to that of Chicago ), had caused its chief planner, Martin Wagner (1885–1957), to foresee the entire centre being made over totally as often as every 25 years. These factors combined to produce some far more radical and futuristic plans for Potsdamer Platz in
14605-421: Was a major revolution in Berlin's public transport, and the forerunner of similar systems now seen in several German cities. The underground sections alternated with sections elevated above ground on viaducts – hence the alternative name Hochbahn (literally "high railway"). The first line (now part of line U1 ) ran from Stralauer Tor to Potsdamer Platz. Begun on 10 September 1896 and opened on 18 February 1902,
14732-573: Was also responsible for the city's Oberbaumbrücke over the River Spree . In 1920 the Vox-group had taken over the building and the following year commissioned its remodelling by Swiss architect Rudolf Otto Salvisberg (1882–1940), and then erected two transmitting antennae. Despite several upgrades between December 1923 and July 1924, the nearby Hotel Esplanade's formidable bulk prevented the transmitter from functioning effectively and so in December 1924 it
14859-451: Was being built at the same time as the hotel and actually ran through the hotel's basement, cutting it in half, thus making the construction of both into something of a technical challenge, but unlike the Wertheim department store (and contrary to several sources), the hotel did not enjoy a separate entrance directly from the station. The Weinhaus Huth , with its distinctive corner cupola, was
14986-516: Was closed on 27 September 1945 due to war damage. In 1939 the S-Bahn, or Stadtbahn (City Railway), arrived. The idea for a North-South Link rapid transit rail line from Unter den Linden to Yorckstraße , via Potsdamer Platz and Anhalter Bahnhof, had first been mooted in 1914, but it was not planned in detail until 1928, and then approval had to wait until 1933. Begun in 1934, it was plagued with disasters. Determination to have it finished in time for
15113-532: Was complete, the Berlin Customs Wall was erected around the city's new perimeter. Potsdamer Platz would eventually develop around the gate at the west end of Leipziger Strasse, which turned south toward the hamlet of Schöneberg after leaving the city. This road, which had developed into part of a trading route running across Europe from Paris to St. Petersburg via Aachen , Berlin and Königsberg , became Elector Frederick William's route of choice to Potsdam,
15240-579: Was erected by architect Wilhelm Walther (1857–1917) and opened in 1904. After closing in 1914, it underwent a revamp before reopening in 1926 under the new name Bayernhof . Meanwhile, in Bellevuestrasse, sandwiched between Café Josty and the Hotel Esplanade but extending right through the block with a separate entrance in Potsdamer Strasse, was the Weinhaus Rheingold , built by Bruno Schmitz (1858–1916) and opened on 6 February 1907. Intended to be
15367-571: Was named Königgrätzer Straße after the Prussian victory over Austria at the Battle of Königgrätz on 3 July 1866, in the Austro-Prussian War . The railway first came to Berlin in 1838, with the opening of the Potsdamer Bahnhof , terminus of a 26 km line linking the city with Potsdam, opened throughout by 29 October (in 1848 the line would be extended to Magdeburg and beyond). Since
15494-402: Was off and running. It was not called that until 8 July 1831, but the area outside the Potsdam Gate began to develop in the early 19th century as a district of quiet villas, for as Berlin became even more congested, many of its richer citizens moved outside the customs wall and built spacious new homes around the trading post, along the newly developing boulevards, and around the southern edge of
15621-509: Was regarded as an interesting curiosity and was quite heavily used on that basis, although it was to be short-lived. The station in the western part of Potsdamer Platz was called Kemperplatz. Less than three months later the Wall came down, which afforded the opportunity to restore the U-Bahn and S-Bahn, thus rendering the M-Bahn redundant. It was closed on 18 July 1991; stripping out of the electrical system began on 31 July, followed by dismantling of
15748-455: Was superseded by a better sited new one, but Vox-Haus lived on as the home of Germany's first radio station, Radiostunde Berlin , founded in 1923, renamed Funkstunde in March 1924, but it moved to a new home in 1931 and closed in 1934. In addition, the former Millionaires' Quarter just to the west of Potsdamer Platz had become a much favoured location for other countries to site their embassies. By
15875-453: Was the location of the infamous Nazi People's Court . Most of the buildings in its vicinity were destroyed or damaged during World War II . From 1961 onwards, most of the area became part of the "No Man's Land" of the Berlin Wall , resulting in the destruction of the remaining buildings. After the fall of the Berlin Wall on 9 November 1989, the square became the focus of attention again, as
16002-460: Was the work of another architect—and another pupil of Schinkel. The Matthiaskirche (St. Matthew's Church), built in 1844–6, was an Italian Romanesque -style building in alternating bands of red and yellow brick, and designed by Friedrich August Stüler (1800–65). This church, one of fewer than half a dozen surviving pre-World War II buildings in the entire area, forms the centrepiece of today's Kulturforum ( Cultural Forum ). Meanwhile, many of
16129-454: Was to allow goods to be transported between the various Berlin stations, thus creating a hated traffic obstruction that lasted for twenty years. Half a dozen or more times a day, Potsdamer Platz ground to a halt while a train of 60 to 100 wagons trundled through at walking pace preceded by a railway official ringing a bell. The construction of the Ringbahn around the city's perimeter, linked to all
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