Sportforum Hohenschönhausen

Sportforum Hohenschönhausen is a multi-purpose sports complex in the locality of Alt-Hohenschönhausen of the borough of Lichtenberg in Berlin. The Sportforum was named Dynamo-Sportforum during the East German era.

Sportforum Hohenschönhausen covers an area between 45 and 50 hectares, and comprises 35 sports facilities, including three ice rinks, two athletics halls, a football stadium, as well as eight other halls and open spaces for various sports. Development of the Dynamo-Sportforum began in 1954. The original building ensemble, including the Dynamo-Sporthalle, which was built in individual sections from 1955, based on designs by an architectural collective led by Walter Schmidt, is a protected building of cultural heritage. Expansion of the Sportforum continued into the 1980s. The complex is the second largest sports complex in Berlin after the Olympiapark.

The Dynamo-Sportforum was the training center where the top athletes and future Olympic medalists trained during the East German era. It was the headquarter of sports association SV Dynamo and home to sports club SC Dynamo Berlin. The Olympic Training Center Berlin (OSP Berlin) is now the main user of the facilities. Around 20 sports clubs are also based in the Sportforum and more than 3,000 athletes use the facilities every day.

Location

The Sportforum Hohenschönhausen is located in the western part of the locality of Alt-Hohenschönhausen of the borough of Lichtenberg in Berlin. It is bordered on the north by an industrial area (on which, among other establishments, the Berliner-Kindl-Schultheiss-Brauerei is located), on the east by the St. Andrew and St. Mark's Cemetery (german: Friedhof der St. Andreas - und St. Markusgemeinde), on the south by the Konrad-Wolf-Straße and on the west by the Weißenseer Weg.

Facilities

The Sportforum Hohenschönhausen covers an area between 45 and 50 hectares, and comprises 35 sports facilities, including three ice rinks, two athletics halls, a football stadium, as well as eight other halls and open spaces for athletics, swimming, handball, volleyball, judo, fencing, archery, beach volleyball and football. The Sportforum is the second largest sports complex in Berlin after the Olympiapark.

Development of the Dynamo-Sportforum began in 1954. The original building ensemble was built in individual sections from 1955, based on designs by an architectural collective led by Walter Schmidt, which had emerged as the winner of an architectural competition held in 1953. The construction was carried out by the state-owned company VEB Industriebau Berlin for the Ministry of the Interior and the Ministry for State Security of East Germany. The Sportforum was expanded according to requirements by the adding of additional facilities and expansion continued into the 1980s.

The original building ensemble built from 1955 to 1959 is now a protected building of cultural importance. The facilities includes artworks such as mosaic artwork by Wolfgang Frankenstein in the foyer of the Dynamo-Sporthalle and the swimming hall, the copper artwork "Sport-Fries" by Wolfgang Frankenstein on the facade of the athletics hall towards the Konrad-Wolf-Straße and the two bronze sculptures "Seated Swimmer" (german: Sitzende Schwimmerin) by Gustav Weidanz and "Standing Swimmer" (german: Stehende Schwimmerinnen ) by Waldemar Grzimek at the outdoor swimming pool.

File:Sportforum Hohenschönhausen.png, A map the main part of the Sportforum Hohenschönhausen.

Use of the site

The Dynamo-Sportforum was built as a training center for elite sport. It was used by the top athletes and future Olympic medalists of East Germany. The sports club SC Dynamo Berlin, with its many sports, disciplines and squads, was the main user of the first ten buildings. The Central Management Office (german: Büro der Zentralen Leitung) (BdZL) of SV Dynamo also had its offices in the Dynamo-Sportforum.

The Olympic Training Center Berlin (OSP Berlin) has used the Sportform since the beginning of the 1990s and is now the main user of the facilities. More than 300 national team athletes regularly train in the facility. The Olympic Training Center Berlin (OSP Berlin) is the largest Olympic training center in Germany.

The Sportforum is also home to eleven state training centres with around 800 state team athletes, the location for the School and High-Performance Sports Center Berlin (SLZB) (formerly known as the elite Children and Youth Sports School (KJS) ”Werner Seelenbinder”), the "House of Athletes" with around 200 boarding school places, and the Institute for Sports Science of the Humboldt University of Berlin, with approximately 500 students. Around 20 sports clubs as based in the Sportforum and more than 3,000 athletes use the facilities every day.

The main users among the sports clubs based in the Sportforum are SC Berlin, Berliner TSC, BFC Dynamo, Eisbären Berlin junior teams and Alba Berlin junior teams. Other users are Füchse Berlin, SSG Humboldt zu Berlin, SC Charlottenburg and SV Preußen Berlin.

Ice sports arenas

The Wellblechpalast opened on the sports complex in 1963. It was the home arena of the ice hockey department of SC Dynamo Berlin, and served as the home arena of its continuation, the Eisbären Berlin, until 2008. The arena has a seating capacity for 4,695 people. The arena is still used as a training facility by the professional team of Eisbären Berlin and is the home arena of the youth teams of Eisbären Berlin.

A 400 m speed skating indoor arena opened on 17 November 1986, and was the first covered speed skating oval in the world, one day prior to Thialf in Heerenveen which hosted the World Allround Speed Skating Championships for Men later that season.

Speed skating track records

*500 m (m): 34.85; Jeremy Wotherspoon, 14 March 2003
*500 m (w): 37.52; Jenny Wolf, 6 November 2009
*1000 m (m): 1:08.53; Shani Davis, 6 November 2009
*1000 m (w): 1:15.04; Christine Nesbitt, 11 March 2012
*1500 m (m): 1:44.47; Shani Davis, 8 November 2009
*1500 m (w): 1:54:88; Jorien ter Mors, 8 December 2013
*3000 m (m): 3:46.17; Håvard Bøkko, 25 October 2008
*3000 m (w): 4:00.75; Martina Sáblíková, 6 November 2009
*5000 m (m): 6:09.76; Sven Kramer, 17 November 2006
*5000 m (w): 6:59.26; Martina Sáblíková, 10 February 2008
*10000 m (m): 13:09.06; Sven Kramer, 10 February 2008
*Team pursuit (m): 3:40.79; Netherlands, 19 November 2006
*Team pursuit (w): 3:01.03; Canada, 11 March 2012

Football stadium

A sports field on the site of the football stadium existed already in the 1920s. The site was known as the Sportplatz Steffenstraße. The current stadium was opened in 1959 and held a capacity of 10,000 spectators at the start of the 1961-62 season. SC Dynamo Berlin played its first seasons at the Walter-Ulbricht-Stadion in Mitte, but moved to the Dynamo-Sportforum after the construction of the Berlin wall in the autumn of 1961. The stadium was gradually expanded
during the 1960s. The capacity was 14,000 spectators at the start of the 1969-70 season, of which 5,000 were seated and 9,000 standing.

BFC Dynamo began to play some home matches at the larger and more centrally located Friedrich-Ludwig-Jahn-Sportpark in Prenzlauer Berg during the 1971-72 season. The Friedrich-Ludwig-Jahn-Sportpark had become vacant when FC Vortwärts Berlin was relocated to Frankfurt an der Oder on 31 July 1971. The large stadium in the Friedrich-Ludwig-Jahn-Sportpark was also equipped with floodlights, unlike the smaller football stadium in the Dynamo-Sportforum, which permitted for matches in the evening. Nevertheless, BFC Dynamo played its 1972-73 UEFA Cup matches against SCO Angers, Levski Sofia and Liverpool F.C. at the stadium. The capacity of the stadium was 20,000 spectators from the 1972-73 season. The attendance of 20,000 spectators during the match against Liverpool F.C. on 29 November 1972 is still the record attendance for the stadium.

BFC Dynamo eventually moved its home matches permanently to the Friedrich-Ludwig-Jahn-Sportpark in the mid-1970s.) from Deutsches Sportecho and Die neue Fußballwoche (FuWo) ( De) first mentioned the Friedrich-Ludwig-Jahn-Sportpark as a stadium of BFC Dynamo before the 1976-77 season. The Dynamo-Stadion im Sportforum was rarely used for larger matches from then. The stadium would be used mostly by the reserve team BFC Dynamo II. BFC Dynamo II played in the second tier DDR-Liga. BFC Dynamo returned to the Dynamo-Stadion im Sportforum in the 1986-87 season, as the Friedrich-Ludwig-Jahn-Sportpark was under renovation. The capacity was listed at 14,000 spectators at the beginning of the season. The team also played its 1986-87 European Cup matches against Örgryte IS and Brøndby IF at the stadium. The match against Örgryte IS on 1 October 1986 was attended by 15,000 spectators.

BFC Dynamo, under the interim name FC Berlin, returned permanently to the Stadion im Sportforum in the 1992-93 season. The club made plans in 1998 to buy the stadium. The plans eventually failed due to lack of financial resources. The club also made plans in 2006 to build a new modern football stadium in the Sportforum Hohenschönhausen. These plans did not materialize either. Supporters of BFC Dynano equipped the stadium with buckets seats and built a new clubhouse next to the stadium in 2002-2003. The stadium now has a capacity of 10,000 standing places and 2,400 seated places, of which 400 are roofed. The back strait (german: Gegengerade) and the two curved stands are filled with gravel and equipped with safety barriers. The stadium has a manual scoreboard above the southern curved stand.

The Stadion im Sportforum was equipped with a 25 meter player tunnel and plexiglass-clad coaching benches in November 2004. The stadium was temporarily closed at the end of the 2005-06 season following riots during the match between BFC Dynamo and 1. FC Union Berlin on 13 may 2006. The stadium was then refurbished in 2006-2007 to increase safety and meet requirements of the Northeastern German Football Association (NOFV). The refurbishment included a new fence. BFC Dynamo moved permanently to the Friedrich-Ludwig-Jahn-Sportpark in the 2014–15 season, following its advance to the Regionalliga Nordost and the subsequent higher media and spectator interest. However, the club returned to play matches at the Stadion im Sportforum at the end of the 2018-19 season, due to security issues relating to the deteriorating state of the floodlights at the Friedrich-Ludwig-Jahn-Stadion, which resulted in a temporary closure of the stadium. The club was then set to return to the Stadion im Sportforum during the 2020–21 season, as the Friedrich-Ludwig-Jahn-Stadion was planned to be demolished and then redeveloped.

The German Football Association (DFB) has earlier classified the Stadion im Sportforum with a possible third division standard, if only a few requirements are met, such as new press seats and a better separated press block. The Senate of Berlin is planning renovations in the Sportforum for a cost of €3 million as of 2020. The Stadion im Sportforum was equipped with a floodlight system in April 2021. The floodlight system that was installed was the former mobile floodlight system that had previously been used at the Friedrich-Ludwig-Jahn-Stadion in replacement of the old floodlight system that had been shut down due to its poor structural and technical condition. The mobile floodlight system was no longer needed at the Friedrich-Ludwig-Jahn-Stadion at the time, as the operating permit for the stadium had expired. A floodlight system is needed in order for the Stadion im Sportform to meet the requirements for matches in the Regionalliga.

BFC Dynamo officially announced on 21 March 2021 that it has now returned to the Sportforum Hohenschönhausen, as the operating permit for the Friedrich-Ludwig-Jahn-Stadion expired on 31 December 2020. The club organized a work effort in the summer of 2021 to get the stadium in shape for the upcoming season. Supporters gathered and cleared sections of the old stadium from weeds. Members of the interest group IG BFC'er also restored the iconic manual scoreboard in time for the first home match of the 2021-22 Regionalliga Nordost against FC Energie Cottbus on 28 July 2021. BFC Dynamo then played its match against VfB Stuttgart in the first round of the 2021-22 DFB-Pokal at the Stadion im Sportforum on 7 August 2021.

Dynamo-Sporthalle

The Dynamo-Sporthalle is an indoor sports hall with a capacity of 2,000 to 4,000 spectators located on the Weißenseer Weg. The sports hall was built from 1955 and 1958. It was inaugurated in presence of SED First Secretary Walter Ulbricht, SV Dynamo President Erich Mielke and sprinter Christa Stubnick, among others, on 25 January 1958. It measures 47 meters in width, 65 meters in length and 15 meters in height inside, and thus allows several sports such as athletics, handball, boxing, judo, basketball and gymnastics.

The Dynamo-Sporthalle was also used for congresses and political mass meetings during the East German era, such as the first Women's congress of the Democratic Women's League of Germany (DFD) on 25 June 1964. The Dynamo-Sporthalle was also the location for the special party congresses of the Socialist Unity Party (SED) on 8-9 and 16–17 December 1989, when the party decided to rename itself SED-PDS.

The Dynamo-Sporthalle is still in operation and is used for various smaller events.

Sporthotel and Congress center

The Sporthotel and Congress center (german: Sporthotel und Kongresszentrum im Sportforum) was built to serve the athletes training at the Sportforum and to complement the Sportforum. The facility contained a hotel with 200 beds, a congress center and a restaurant. The Sporthotel and Congress center is located at the south-western end of the Sportforum (in the corner between Weißenseer Weg and Konrad-Wolf-Straße).

The Dynamo-Sporthotel was built from 1960 to 1962 as a hotel in three storeys with an attached restaurant. The facility was significantly expanded in the late 1970s with a congress center in two to three storeys.
The Sporthotel and Congress center was made a showcase complex for East German sports. It was used by athletes such as Franziska van Almsick of SC Dynamo Berlin and Claudia Pechstein, but became vacant in the 1990s and fell into disrepair. The site is currently awaiting redevelopment and the remains of the Sporthotel and Congress center will be demolished. A new hotel is planned to be built on the site, as of 2020.

Gallery

File:Bundesarchiv Bild 183-52607-0003, Berlin, Dynamo-Sporthalle, Innenansicht.jpg, Inside the Dynamo-Sporthalle during an Athletics Festival in 1958.
File:Bundesarchiv Bild 183-B1103-0003-001, Ingrid Föst.jpg, Athlete Ingrid Föst of SC Dynamo Berlin during the Werner-Seelenbinder-Gedenkturnier in the Dynamo-Sporthalle in 1963.
File:Bundesarchiv Bild 183-C0325-0007-005, Berlin, Hohenschönhausen, Dynamo-Sporthotel, Foyer.jpg, The foyer of the Dynamo-Sporthotel in 1964.
File:Bundesarchiv Bild 183-R0811-0302, Berlin, Schwimmhalle.jpg, Inside the swimming hall during the East German Swimming Championship in 1976.
File:Bundesarchiv Bild 183-1986-0816-021, BFC Dynamo - FC Vorwärts Frankfurt-Oder 4-1.jpg, Michael Schulz of BFC Dynamo and defending Mario Roth of FC Vorwärts Frankfurt, during a match at the Dynamo-Stadion im Sportforum in 1986.


File:Sportforum Dynamohalle 01.jpg, The Dynamo-Sporthalle in 2006.
File:Sportforum Berlin Eissporthalle.JPG, The Wellblechpalast in 2006.
File:Sportforum Hotel 01.jpg, The ruins of the Congress center in 2006.
File:Sportforum Berlin-Hohenschönhausen.jpg, The speed skating oval during 2008–09 ISU Speed Skating World Cup in Berlin in 2008.
File:Sportforum Fußballstadion.jpg, A match between BFC Dynamo and BSG Chemie Leipzig in 2021.

See also

* SV Dynamo
*SC Dynamo Berlin

Notes

References

DESG

External links

Sportforum Berlin
– City of Berlin

{{DEFAULTSORT:Sportforum Hohenschonhausen
Indoor arenas in Germany
Speed skating venues in Germany
Football venues in Berlin
Football venues in East Germany
Athletics (track and field) venues in East Germany
Berliner FC Dynamo
SC Dynamo Berlin
SV Dynamo
Sports venues in Berlin
History of sport in East Germany
Indoor speed skating venues
1970 establishments in East Germany
1986 establishments in East Germany