To be or not to be..
Posted on March 1, 2010
Currently all BVG buses are being adorned with a new be.Berlin logo, part of the city’s current marketing campaign. This replaces the Brandenburg Gate logo previously used. Many Berlin transport enthusiasts are not happy with the new logo as they erroneously imagine it to be another example of an anglicism creeping into everyday German. This is not actually the case, as be.Berlin is just a play on the international www. code for Berlin: BEBERL. Check out the be.Berlin campaign in English here!
I personally think the new logo is an improvement on the older Brandenburg Gate version. From a distance, the gate always looked like dustbins (trash cans) to me!
The old and new logos, seen here at Storkower Straße
Click on photo to enlarge!
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Around and About Berlin - Cecilienhaus, 10585 Berlin
Posted on February 5, 2010
Cecilienhaus in Berlin- Charlottenburg was built between 1907 and 1909. It’s architects were Walter Spickendorff und Rudolf Walter. It was designed as a social welfare building for the “Vaterländischer Frauenverein Charlottenburg” or “Patriotic Women’s Guild of Charlottenburg”. Named after Princess Cecilie (1886-1954), the German Crown Princess, it was Charlottenburg’s welfare centre with a gynaecological clinic, confinement station, crèche and soup kitchen, as well as being the headquarters of the German Red Cross, including a sanatorium with fifty beds.
Click on photo to enlarge!
The building has a severe limestone facade, as well as a pillared balcony on the top floor. Originally, there was a chemist and a porters lodge on either side of the entrance. A large part of the complex of courtyards and back-houses was destroyed in World war Two and only the front building and one courtyard survives. The building is now used commercially and has lost it’s social welfare connections.
The entrance is still adorned with the inscription ‘Vaterländischer Frauenverein Charlottenburg’
Click on photo to enlarge!
Click on photo to enlarge!
Other postings on Stahlzeit Buildings in Berlin
In Schöneberg: Click here!
In Treptow: Click here!
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January 2010 in Berlin - Cold and White
Posted on January 31, 2010
We are now into our seventh week of snow here in Berlin and the daily trek through the snow is becoming a little bit wearing.. during this seven week period we’ve had two periods of extreme temperatures.. down to -24°C at night, with -19°C in the daytime.
The frozen Spree at Treptower Park
A slideshow of some of my ’snowy’ photos can be viewed on Flickriver by clicking here!
I haven’t been able to write as much as I’d like in January… In fact nothing at all.. Due to other commitments I haven’t had much time to prepare anything for the blog. So what I thought I would do is just add a summary of a few events and such like, that have been going on here in Berlin since the middle of December 2009.
Public Timetable Change - 14 December 2009
The European wide timetable change occurred over the weekend of 13/14 December 2009. There were a couple of routeing changes on the buses, the most important of which was the re-routeing and extension of route 248 from (Breitenbachplatz) - Alexanderplatz to Ostbahnhof, in order to serve the new BVG headquarters (TRIAS gebäude) which had been without a public transport connection since the BVG relocated there in September 2008.
More significant was the renaming of U-Bahn station Zinnowitzer Straße to Naturkundemuseum. The reasoning behind this was the continuing popularity of this Natural History Museum, with its Dinosaur exhibition, the most modern in Europe. The choice of Zinnowitzer Straße in 1991 as the name for the station had always been controversial.
U-Bhf Naturkundemuseum, (Natural History Museum) To enlarge click here!
U-Bhf Zinnowitzer Straße, the name of the station between 1991 and 2009 To enlarge click here!
U-Bhf Stettiner Bahnhof was the name of the station from opening on 30 January 1923 until it was renamed Nordbahnhof in 1951. It remained Nordbahnhof until 1991, although becuase of the building of the Berlin Wall it was closed from 13 August 1961 until 30 June 1990.To enlarge click here!
Allocation changes also saw new Citaro buses allocated to sister routes 106 and 204. The 106 being simultaneously transferred from BVG operation to Hartmann Buses.
Inclement weather has made impossible to get shots of clean buses since they entered service. To enlarge click here!
A new Citaro working route 106 on Seestraße in Wedding
A dirty 8628 on the 106 shows off the newer style back end of the latest citaros
more to follow….
» Filed Under Around & About Berlin, Berlin, Buses, Transport, U-Bahn | 3 Comments
Happy New Year!
Posted on January 1, 2010
New Years Day in Berlin-Schöneberg
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Around and About Berlin - U-Bhf Konstanzer Straße
Posted on November 29, 2009
Konstanzer Straße is one of my favourite Berlin Underground stations. Opened on 28 April 1978 as part of the extension of ‘Linie 7′ (now known as U7) from Fehrbelliner Platz to Richard-Wagner Platz. The design of the tiled wall decoration seems to have stood the test of time well. Something that many other ‘overstyled’ Berliner Underground stations of that period haven’t achieved.
Berlin ist UNESCO city of design poster
Looking west along the eastbound platform (to Rudow)
U-Bhf Konstanzer Straße is also served by bus route 101 U Turmstraße - Zehlendorf (Sachtlebenstraße)
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Around and About Berlin - Christmas is coming
Posted on November 28, 2009
Every year, many people who consider themselves to be ‘Champions of the environment’, get rather uncomfortable when it comes to recycling their Christmas Trees once the festivities are over.
A Berliner artist has taken these thoughts to heart and come up with a Christmas Tree made up of junk - what might be called a recycled Christmas Tree.
The tree, on Wilmersdorfer Straße in Charlottenburg, can be admired until the beginning of January 2010.
» Filed Under Around & About Berlin, Berlin | 1 Comment
22 November 1963 - JFK Assassinated
Posted on November 22, 2009
Forty-Six years ago today, John F. Kennedy was assassinated in Dallas, Texas. Five months previously in June 1963, Kennedy had visited West Berlin, making his famous ‘Ich bin ein Berliner speech’ at Rathaus Schöneberg.
Looking through my collection recently, I noticed that I have some stamped ‘covers’ that date from that period.
This cover from Berlin to Bavaria was stamped a day later on 24 June 1963.
Following the Vietnam War, the relationship beween the ordinary West Berliner and the Americans became much more strained.. But in 1963, two years after the building of the Berlin Wall, the isolated West Berliners were still happy for any sign of solidarity from the outside world. Of course, in the ensuing years, we have learnt that although Kennedy could be considered one of the great American Presidents, he certainly wasn’t the person he was imagined to be at that time.. A beacon of hope for the future..
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Forbidden Places - Bahnhof Potsdamer Platz
Posted on November 10, 2009
Until the 9th November, I will been posting a selection of photos of Forbidden Places - locations that up to the fall of the Berlin Wall, were not accessible to the ‘ordinary person on the street’.
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Munich Tram Replacement Routes - Tram 37 comes back for a week
Posted on November 8, 2009
School holidays saw the operation of München replacement tram route 37 for the second time this year. Renovation work on the roof of the underground station and shopping area at Karlsplatz, Stachus, meant that tram routes 17 and 18 were diverted from the east to terminate at Karolinenplatz.
The western branches of these routes were once again combined to operate as route 37 Amalienburgstraße - Romanplatz - Arnulftstraße - Hauptbahnhof - Landsberger Straße - Westendstraße - Gondrellplatz.
Unusually, the flourescent ‘two-way arrow’ diversion sign is not displayed on 2164’s windscreen.
More Information by clicking here!
Seen here on Friday 6th November, 2101, München’s first standard R2.2 tram, isn’t displaying a ‘two-way arrow’ diversion sign either…
The other 2009 replacement tram routes can be seen by clicking here!
©2009 All images are my copyright
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Forbidden Places - Ebertstraße
Posted on November 6, 2009
Until the 9th November, I will been posting a selection of photos of Forbidden Places - locations that up to the fall of the Berlin Wall, were not accessible to the ‘ordinary person on the street’.
The preparations for the 20th anniversary celebrations are continuing. Here a first glimse of ‘The Dominos‘ currently being positioned along Ebertstraße, the former course of The Wall. The intention is to set them in motion on the 9th of November at Potsdamer Platz, falling towards the Brandenburg Gate, thereby signifying the fall of the wall.
» Filed Under Around & About Berlin, Berlin | 1 Comment
Around and About Berlin - Bismarckstraße
Posted on November 4, 2009
Berlin got its first taste of winter today, with the first snow of the season..
I was out and about on Bismarckstraße in Charlottenburg.
Bismarckstraße, looking east towards Ernst-Reuter-Platz
The Deutsche Bundesbank building, corner of Leibnizstraße.
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Forbidden Places - Invalidenstraße
Posted on November 2, 2009
Until the 9th November, I will been posting a selection of photos of Forbidden Places - locations that up to the fall of the Berlin Wall, were not accessible to the ‘ordinary person on the street’.
The border of the Boroughs of Tiergarten and Mitte was also the boundary of the British and Soviet sectors of Berlin set up in July 1945.
Looking from West to East in October 2009.
A 1965 view, similar to the one above.
A line has been etched out of the road surface and bridge abutment, as a reminder of the border.
Seen here on the south side of the bridge.
The scene here on November 10th 1989
A memorial to Günter Litfin, which was dedicated on the first anniversary of his death. Litfin, who was shot dead in the river here on 24 August 1961, was the first known person to be killed trying to cross from East to West after the wall was built.
» Filed Under Around & About Berlin, Berlin | 1 Comment
Around and About Berlin - In Autumn
Posted on October 30, 2009
We’ve been having a typical Autumn in Berlin, colourful leaves with a backdrop of grey skies, what is called ‘Hochnebel’ in German, but which has no really good English equivalent apart from ‘low stratus’. The nights are slowly drawing in and the overwhelming atmosphere is one of a receding 2009.
German thoroughness and order - Karl-Marx-Allee in Mitte
Café Achteck and Gas Lamps - Stephansplatz in Moabit
Post Second World War infill development - Freiherr-vom-Stein-Straße in Schöneberg
©IsarSteve 2009 - All images my copyright
» Filed Under Around & About Berlin, Berlin | 2 Comments
