Environment

Berlin to turn Tempelhof airport into park

by Amy Judd | November 26, 2008 at 10:16 am

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Berlin's Tempelhof airport, which was a lifeline for West Berlin during the Soviet blockade, is going to become a park, which will turn one of Europe's most green cities into an even greener space.

It will cost 61 million Euros to convert the now closed airport into a 250 hectare garden - about the size of New York's Central Park.

In 1948 and 1949, Cold War allies supplied West Berlin via an air lift that circumvented a Soviet land blockade. Tempelhof became a symbol of freedom for West Berlin, encircled by Communist East Germany.

A spokesman for the Berlin government, Marko Rosteck, said the monolithic limestone terminal, designed by Ernst Sagebiel, will be preserved.

He said a wide variety of proposals for the terminal's use were being considered.

"We're very fortunate to have a giant patch of green in the heart of the city just waiting to be developed," Rosteck said, adding Berlin hopes to host an international garden exhibition in 2017. The city hopes that will attract 3.5 million tourists.

"It will make Berlin, which is already one of the greenest capitals in Europe, even greener," he added.

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Christian Drewing (not verified)

at 14:15 on November 26th, 2008

Yesterday it was in the news that after closing the airport on October 30th, 2008 they still had three historic machines on ground that weren't able to start on the closing day due to bad visual circumstances.

They were allowed to start on November 25th with special permission of the air traffic control - otherwise they would have been to be removed by trucks, what a shame!

A friend of mine, living in the old plane's entry lane in Berlin-Neukölln told me later that he was not able to sleep the first week after closing because he was missing the airplanes' noise. ;-)