5. Bösebrücke and Bornholmer Straße
On 9 November 1989, this border crossing was catapulted to world fame overnight. That evening, after the
GDR government had announced a new travel regulation, crowds of East Berliners gathered there and forced the opening of this checkpoint as the first of seven in Berlin (
Bösebrücke).
6. Schwedter Steg
The Berlin Wall Trail's most interesting bridge is
Schwedter Steg, built in 1997/1998. This filigreed pedestrian overpass with its two supporting arches spans the northern ring of the railroad and the S-Bahn from Schönhauser Allee to Bornholmer Strasse, a section of track known as the "Ulbricht curve".
7. Mauerpark - Max-Schmeling-Halle
This
park on the grounds of the old Nordbahnhof train station and the former border strip between Wedding and Prenzlauer Berg was laid out after the fall of the Wall. East of the former "no man's land" are the Jahn-Sportpark, built when the GDR hosted the 3rd "World Festival of Youth and Students", and the Max-Schmeling-Halle, a multipurpose arena.
Foto: Wolfgang Bittner, LDA
8. Memorial on Bernauer Straße
Bernauer Strasse achieved tragic notoriety after 13 August 1961. Dramatic escapes shocked and moved the world, as desperate people attempted to leap from the windows of houses on the East Berlin side of the border to the sidewalk below in West Berlin (Gedenkstätte Berliner Mauer).
9. Invalidenfriedhof
This historical cemetery between Scharnhorststrasse und the Berlin-Spandauer Schifffahrtskanal is one of Berlin's oldest and, as a relic of Prussian military history, recalls the Wars of Liberation from 1813 to 1815. In GDR days, the Berlin Wall cut through the cemetery.
Foto: Ina Dorendorf
10. Berlin's Hauptbahnhof
Before the fall of the Wall, this was a minor train station on an urban S-Bahn line. Today a vast glass-covered hall and high arched office towers span the railroad viaduct. They connect the S-Bahn's east-west line with the north-south tunnel of Berlin's new railway network.
11. Parliament and government district
The new
government district symbolizes the way the two halves of the formerly divided city have grown together. The "Band des Bundes", a ribbon of government buildings designed by Axel Schultes and Charlotte Frank in 1992, links a series of the most important government buildings - spanning the Spree River and the former border fortifications from west to east - like a string of pearls.
