The Westfalenhütte is an industrial site in the northeast of Dortmund,

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 was established by the

steel company This is a list of the largest steel-producing companies in the world mostly based on the list by the World Steel Association. This list ranks steelmakers by volume of steel production in millions of tonnes and includes all steelmakers with producti ...

Hoesch AG Hoesch AG was an important steel and mining company with locations in the Ruhr area and Siegen. In 1871, Hoesch was founded by Leopold Hoesch. In 1938, Hoesch employed 30,000 people. In 1972, the prominent steel producer merged with the Dutch ...

in 1871. At the peak of the so-called

Wirtschaftswunder The ''Wirtschaftswunder'' (, "economic miracle"), also known as the Miracle on the Rhine, was the rapid reconstruction and development of the economies of West Germany and Austria after World War II (adopting an ordoliberalism-based social ma ...

approximately 25,000 people were working there. Following changes in the steel industry and a consolidation process in the sector, activities on the Westfalenhütte were reduced to a few, economically sustainable core areas. Today more than 1,000 people are working on the site of the Westfalenhütte. The Westfalenhütte stretches over approximately five

kilometer The kilometre ( SI symbol: km; or ), spelt kilometer in American English, is a unit of length in the International System of Units (SI), equal to one thousand metres (kilo- being the SI prefix for ). It is now the measurement unit used for ex ...

s from east to west, and nearly four kilometers from north to south. The territory is now owned by the

ThyssenKrupp AG ThyssenKrupp AG (, ; stylized as thyssenkrupp) is a German industrial engineering and steel production multinational conglomerate. It is the result of the 1999 merger of Thyssen AG and Krupp and has its operational headquarters in Duisburg a ...

and is the largest abandoned industrial area in Europe.

Soviet The Soviet Union,. officially the Union of Soviet Socialist Republics. (USSR),. was a transcontinental country that spanned much of Eurasia from 1922 to 1991. A flagship communist state, it was nominally a federal union of fifteen nation ...

leader Mikhail Gorbachev visited the Westfalenhütte in 1989 and spoke in front of 8,500 steel workers. The Westfalenhütte had its own

railway station Rail transport (also known as train transport) is a means of transport that transfers passengers and goods on wheeled vehicles running on rails, which are incorporated in tracks. In contrast to road transport, where the vehicles run on a prep ...

, called Dortmund-Hoesch, which was in use until 1992. A light rail station from the U44 line is still called Westfalenhütte. The Hoeschpark, a recreational area for industrial workers of the Hoesch AG, was established in 1937 on the site of the Weisse Wiese, the first home stadium of football club

Borussia Dortmund Ballspielverein Borussia 09 e. V. Dortmund, commonly known as Borussia Dortmund (), BVB (), or simply Dortmund (), is a German professional sports club based in Dortmund, North Rhine-Westphalia. It is best known for its men's professional fo ...

External links

History and pictures of the Westfalenhütte
(in German) industriedenkmal.de
map ca. 1973
* Daniel Hinze
Westfalenhütte
(in German) dubtown.de * Harald Finster

(in German) * Ingo Bornemann

Hoesch-Arbeiter jubelten Gorbatschow zu
(in German) Ruhr-Nachrichten 15 June 2009 {{DEFAULTSORT:Westfalenhutte Industrial parks in Germany Steel industry of Germany Dortmund