Rathaus Bridge (german: Rathausbrücke, "Town Hall Bridge") is a bridge in the central

Mitte Mitte () is the first and most central borough of Berlin. The borough consists of six sub-entities: Mitte proper, Gesundbrunnen, Hansaviertel, Moabit, Tiergarten and Wedding. It is one of the two boroughs (the other being Friedrichshain-Kreuzb ...

district of

Berlin Berlin ( , ) is the capital and largest city of Germany by both area and population. Its 3.7 million inhabitants make it the European Union's most populous city, according to population within city limits. One of Germany's sixteen constitue ...

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 ...

. Rebuilt in 2012, it is one of the oldest connections between the historic city centres of

Alt-Berlin Alt-Berlin ("Old Berlin"), also spelled ''Altberlin'', is a neighborhood (''Stadtviertel''), situated in the Berliner locality (''Ortsteil'') of Mitte, part of the homonymous borough. In the 13th century it was the sister town of the old Cöll ...

and

Cölln Cölln () was the twin city of Old Berlin (Altberlin) from the 13th century to the 18th century. Cölln was located on the Fisher Island section of Spree Island, opposite Altberlin on the western bank of the River Spree, until the cities we ...

across the

Spree Spree may refer to: Geography * Spree (river), river in Germany Film and television * ''The Spree'', a 1998 American television film directed by Tommy Lee Wallace * ''Spree'' (film), a 2020 American film starring Joe Keery * "Spree" (''Numbers' ...

river. It is named after the nearby

Rotes Rathaus The Rotes Rathaus (, ''Red City Hall'') is the town hall of Berlin, located in the Mitte district on Rathausstraße near Alexanderplatz. It is the home to the governing mayor and the government (the Senate of Berlin) of the state of Berlin. The ...

city hall.

History

A first wooden bridge to Spree Island at the site is documented in the 13th century, then the second river crossing parallel to the Mühlendamm causeway in the south. Called ''Lange Brücke'' due to its length, it was the site where the double city's burghers erected their common town hall. When the

Brandenburg Brandenburg (; nds, Brannenborg; dsb, Bramborska ) is a states of Germany, state in the northeast of Germany bordering the states of Mecklenburg-Vorpommern, Lower Saxony, Saxony-Anhalt, and Saxony, as well as the country of Poland. With an ar ...

elector Frederick II Irontooth chose Berlin-Cölln as his residence, he had the City Palace erected on the island from 1443 onwards, suspiciously eyed by the citizens. When a new bridge was erected from 1661, the

Hohenzollern The House of Hohenzollern (, also , german: Haus Hohenzollern, , ro, Casa de Hohenzollern) is a German royal (and from 1871 to 1918, imperial) dynasty whose members were variously princes, electors, kings and emperors of Hohenzollern, Brandenb ...

electors funded part of the costs. Under the rule of Elector Frederick III, in 1691, plans for a new construction were designed by

Johann Arnold Nering Johann Arnold Nering (or Nehring; 13 January 1659 – 21 October 1695) was a German Baroque architect in the service of Brandenburg-Prussia. A native of Wesel, Cleves, Nering was educated largely in Holland. From 1677 to 1679 he also travelled ...

in a

Baroque 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 ...

style, consistent with the adjacent Palace. Works began the next year and were completed in 1694. Five vaulted arches, richly decorated, spanned the Spree waters; bearing the

equestrian statue An equestrian statue is a statue of a rider mounted on a horse, from the Latin ''eques'', meaning 'knight', deriving from ''equus'', meaning 'horse'. A statue of a riderless horse is strictly an equine statue. A full-sized equestrian statue is a d ...

of "Great Elector"

Frederick William of Brandenburg Frederick William (german: Friedrich Wilhelm; 16 February 1620 – 29 April 1688) was Elector of Brandenburg and Duke of Prussia, thus ruler of Brandenburg-Prussia, from 1640 until his death in 1688. A member of the House of Hohenzollern, he is ...

Andreas Schlüter Andreas Schlüter (1659 – c. June 1714) was a German baroque sculptor and architect, active in the Holy Roman Empire of the German Nation, the Polish–Lithuanian Commonwealth, and the Russian Tsardom. Biography Andreas Schlüter was bor ...

, which was ceremonially unveiled in 1703. Refurbished under the auspices of Carl Friedrich Schinkel in 1817–19, the bridge remained in use for about 200 years. Finally by the end of the 19th century, the construction had become too small for both the traffic on the bridge and the cargo barges passing under it. A new bridge structure with three vaults was erected in 1895 and renamed ''Kurfürstenbrücke'' ("Electors' Bridge") the following year. The bridge was severely damaged by retiring

Wehrmacht The ''Wehrmacht'' (, ) were the unified armed forces of Nazi Germany from 1935 to 1945. It consisted of the ''Heer'' (army), the ''Kriegsmarine'' (navy) and the ''Luftwaffe'' (air force). The designation "''Wehrmacht''" replaced the previous ...

forces during the final

Battle of Berlin The Battle of Berlin, designated as the Berlin Strategic Offensive Operation by the Soviet Union, and also known as the Fall of Berlin, was one of the last major offensives of the European theatre of World War II. After the Vistula– ...

in 1945. The equestrian statue had already been evacuated in 1943; it was later rediscovered in

Lake Tegel Lake Tegel (german: Tegeler See) () is the second largest lake in Berlin, Germany. It is situated in the northwest of the city in the Reinickendorf borough, in the ''Ortsteil'' of Tegel. Overview The historic name ''Tegel'' (first recorded in 13 ...

and installed at its present site in front of

Charlottenburg Palace Schloss Charlottenburg (Charlottenburg Palace) is a Baroque palace in Berlin, located in Charlottenburg, a district of the Charlottenburg-Wilmersdorf borough. The palace was built at the end of the 17th century and was greatly expanded during th ...

. After the war, a provisional reconstruction was carried out according to plans by

Richard Ermisch Richard Ermisch (full name: ''Georg Friedrich Richard Ermisch'') (17 June 1885, Halle an der Saale, Saxony-Anhalt – 7 December 1960, Berlin) was a German architect, painter and graphic designer. From 1903 to 1906, he attended the 'Kön ...

; nevertheless, the damaged remnants had to be removed in 1952. The

East Berlin East Berlin was the ''de facto'' capital city of East Germany from 1949 to 1990. Formally, it was the Allied occupation zones in Germany, Soviet sector of Berlin, established in 1945. The American, British, and French sectors were known as ...

authorities had a

reinforced concrete Reinforced concrete (RC), also called reinforced cement concrete (RCC) and ferroconcrete, is a composite material in which concrete's relatively low tensile strength and ductility are compensated for by the inclusion of reinforcement having hig ...

structure erected, which was again refurbished when the Palace of the Republic was built at the site of the former City Palace in 1973–76. The present-day bridge is a modern

composite construction Composite construction is a generic term to describe any building construction involving multiple dissimilar materials. Composite construction is often used in building aircraft, watercraft, and building construction. There are several reasons to ...

erected at the behest of the Berlin

Senate A senate is a deliberative assembly, often the upper house or chamber of a bicameral legislature. The name comes from the ancient Roman Senate (Latin: ''Senatus''), so-called as an assembly of the senior (Latin: ''senex'' meaning "the el ...

from 2009 onwards. After several overruns in terms of both construction costs and periods, it was inaugurated on 27 September 2012.

External links

* {{Coord, 52.5171, N, 13.4040, E, source:wikidata, display=title Bridges in Berlin Mitte