Marcel Krueger discovers fragments of history along west Berlin’s Heerstrasse…
West Berlin’s Heerstrasse isn’t much to look at. A mundane, five-lane expressway connecting the trade fair with the district of Spandau in the west, it eventually morphs into federal highway No. 5, transporting its human cargo towards the northern city of Hamburg. But to stroll alongside this Ballardian mesh of concrete and speeding metal is to cut a cross-section through 150 years of Berlin history; to follow in the footsteps of emperors, no less.
Heerstraße (literally Army Road) begins in the German Empire at Theodor-Heuss-Platz in Charlottenburg, close to the expo halls, the Funkturm and the International Congress Centre (ICC). Until March 1950, this part of Heerstraße was still known as Kaiserdamm, or Emperor’s Embankment. Heerstrasse was planned and built as a military road, connecting the Prussian military training ground at Döberitzer Heide with the Berlin City Palace.
Roadworks started in 1874, and the road was officially opened by Kaiser Wilhelm II here in Charlottenburg in 1911. There were no houses then, only an empty roundabout and a few roads.
The street skips Weimar Berlin, heading straight into Nazi Germany in the shape of the long, grey, nondescript building at No. 12, a.k.a. the former headquarters of the Reichsjugendführung, erected in 1938. The Reichsjugendführung was an organisation set up to control all the German youth organisations of the time, including the Hitlerjugend (Hitler Youth) and the BDM, the Bund Deutscher Mädel, its female counterpart.
Its director Artur Axmann, whose office was located in Heerstrasse 12, stayed in the Führerbunker during Hitler’s last days and escaped from Berlin to the front lines of the Western Allies during the final outbreak from the lair a few hours before Hitler’s suicide.
More Nazi buildings follow: besides the colossal Olympic stadium and the surrounding park, erected for the games in 1936 and still used for a variety of activities such as the final of the 2006 Soccer World Cup and Hertha Berlin football matches, there’s another relic from these times still utilised today.
Behind the Pichelsberg S-Bahn-station, you will find the Waldbühne, or forest stage, built as part of the Olympic development and one of the main open-air-stages in Berlin today. When attending Pearl Jam or Bruce Springsteen shows here, few concert goers are aware that this was