Goerdelerring is a street and major

tram A tram (called a streetcar or trolley in North America) is a rail vehicle that travels on tramway tracks on public urban streets; some include segments on segregated right-of-way. The tramlines or networks operated as public transport are ...

interchange station in

Leipzig Leipzig ( , ; Upper Saxon: ) is the most populous city in the German state of Saxony. Leipzig's population of 605,407 inhabitants (1.1 million in the larger urban zone) as of 2021 places the city as Germany's eighth most populous, as wel ...

Germany Germany,, officially the Federal Republic of Germany, is a country in Central Europe. It is the second most populous country in Europe after Russia, and the most populous member state of the European Union. Germany is situated betwe ...

. It is named after

Carl Friedrich Goerdeler Carl Friedrich Goerdeler (; 31 July 1884 – 2 February 1945) was a monarchist conservative German politician, executive, economist, civil servant and opponent of the Nazi regime. He opposed some anti-Jewish policies while he held office and was ...

The street

The street ''Goerdelerring'' is part of the inner city ring road of Leipzig, leading the traffic around the city center. It is 361 meters (1184 ft.) long and reaches from the branch of the ''Ranstädter Steinweg'' to the branch of the ''Käthe-Kollwitz-Straße'' in a mainly northeast-southwest direction. The street has three lanes for car traffic in each direction and two tracks for tramways in the middle which are also used by night busses. The first tramway tracks on the street that is now ''Goerdelerring'' have been laid in 1872 as part of the original horse tram network of the city of Leipzig. There are no buildings immediately next to the street. Nevertheless, there are buildings with the address ''Goerdelerring''. The most important one is the prior main

firehouse __NOTOC__ A fire station (also called a fire house, fire hall, firemen's hall, or engine house) is a structure or other area for storing firefighting apparatuses such as fire apparatus, fire engines and related vehicles, personal protective eq ...

, now ''Rescue station Mitte'', the extensive refurbishment of which was completed in 2022. (Cost: 30.6 million euros) On the eastern side there is a small green area, as part of the green promenades ring, with the ''

Richard Wagner Wilhelm Richard Wagner ( ; ; 22 May 181313 February 1883) was a German composer, theatre director, polemicist, and conductor who is chiefly known for his operas (or, as some of his mature works were later known, "music dramas"). Unlike most op ...

memorial'' and the ''school museum'', on the western side the parking area of the firehouse and the Leipzig chamber of industry and commerce are situated. The continuation on the inner city ring road is made by the ''Dittrichring'' to the south and the ''Tröndlinring'' to the east. The crossing that forms the northern end of the ''Goerdelerring'' and the northwestern edge of the inner city ring road is one of the busiest crossings in Leipzig. The construction of a 100 meters (330 ft.)

high-rise building A tower block, high-rise, apartment tower, residential tower, apartment block, block of flats, or office tower is a tall building, as opposed to a low-rise building and is defined differently in terms of height depending on the jurisdictio ...

is possible on the Goerdelerring / Ranstädter Steinweg corner property. The opening of the ''Pleißemühlgraben'' (a canal) is also planned along the west side of the Goerdelerring. Until 1945 the street was named ''Fleischerplatz'', the northern crossing had the name ''Schulplatz''. From 1945 to 1991 the whole street was named ''Friedrich-Engels-Platz'' after

Friedrich Engels Friedrich Engels ( ,"Engels"
'' The tramway station ''Goerdelerring'', served by the Leipzig Transport Company, is situated in the middle of the ''Tröndlinring'', immediately east of the crossing that forms the northern end of the ''Goerdelerring''. It was built in 1964 during a reconstruction of the alignment of the ring road. Until 1964 the tracks lay north of today's route nearer to the buildings. The street was widened and a large tramway station with four tracks has been built. Today, the tramway lines 1, 3, 4, 7, 9, 12, 14 and 15 and the nightbus lines N1, N2, N3, N4 and N5 are serving the station making it one of the busiest tramway stations in Leipzig. On weekdays 87 trams per hour stop at Goerdelerring which means in average one tram every 42 seconds.The number of people boarding and alighting before 2020 was 12,300 daily. In 2020, the tramway station was renovated for 18 million euros.

History

The ''Theaterplatz'' with the Old Theater was on the site of today's tramway station ''Gordelerring''. The theater, large enough for 1200 spectators, stood here in the midst of greenery from 1766 to 1943 and was destroyed during the Allied air raids on Leipzig. From 1718 to 1869 there was also a riding house in the

Baroque style The Baroque (, ; ) is a style of architecture, music, dance, painting, sculpture, poetry, and other arts that flourished in Europe from the early 17th century until the 1750s. In the territories of the Spanish and Portuguese empires including t ...

on the Theaterplatz. The tramway station is where the ''Hallesche Zwinger'' (The Halle outer bailey) once stood, the Goerdelerring where the ''Ranstädter Zwinger'' (The Ranstädt outer bailey) was. The areas between the higher and the lower wall of the former city fortifications were called ''Zwinger'' ( outer baileys). Friedrich Gottlob Leonhardi wrote in 1799 that "in these outer baileys one could still walk around the whole city". The ''slaughterhouses on the Pleiße'' (from 1655 until 1891) and an ''old fire station'' (from 1865 until 1880 a

half-timbered house Timber framing (german: Holzfachwerk) and "post-and-beam" construction are traditional methods of building with heavy timbers, creating structures using squared-off and carefully fitted and joined timbers with joints secured by large wooden ...

and predecessor of today’s fire station) were located on the Fleischerplatz. (''Fleischer'' means butcher) According to Leonhardi, there was also a Pentecost pasture in front of the ''Ranstädt Town Gate'' in the area of today's ''Goerdelerring'', where the Leipzig rifle club "used to hold a large annual bird shooter with crossbows, which, however, for the benefit of many residents, has not been held for several years."

Miscellaneous

In 1920, a construction site along today's Goerdelerring was even reserved for a 345 feet tall trade-fair tower. It was to have thirty exhibition floors, each 196 feet wide. The City Council voted scarcely against it. From 1973 to 2004, the pedestrian bridge called ''Blaues Wunder'' (blue wonder) crossed the Goerdelerring / Tröndlinring intersection.

External links

Further information about the Goerdelerring at leipzig-lexikon.de
(in German)
Official web page of the Leipzig Transport Company, with information about the tramway network
(available in English)

References

{{Reflist Streets in Leipzig

The street

History

Miscellaneous

See also

External links

References