Kaiserswerther Strasse

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Kaiserswerther Strasse
coat of arms
Street in Düsseldorf
Kaiserswerther Strasse
In Golzheim
Basic data
place Dusseldorf
District Pempelfort , Golzheim , Stockum
Created June 22, 1895
Connecting roads Nordstrasse , Freiligrathplatz
Cross streets Cordobastraße, Pfalzstraße, Klever Straße , Zietenstraße , Bankstraße, Lützowstraße, Fischerstraße, Homberger Straße, Kennedydamm , Golzheimer Platz, Am Binnenwasser, Georg-Glock-Straße, Uerdinger Straße, Tersteegenstraße, Gerhard-Domagk-Straße, Reeser Straße, Hermann-Weill- Street, Grünewaldstrasse, Erich-Klausener-Strasse, Nelly-Sachs-Strasse, Am Hain, Stockumer Kirchstrasse, Begonienstrasse, Irmerstrasse, Enzianstrasse, Ganghoferstrasse
Buildings Theodor Heuss Bridge , Aquazoo
use
User groups Pedestrian traffic , bicycle traffic , car traffic , public transport
Road design Light rail runs on green strips
Technical specifications
Street length 3,800 m

The Kaiserswertherstrasse (also briefly KWS is called) is a 3.8 km long north-south traffic artery in the North Rhine-Westphalian state capital Dusseldorf . It begins in the inner-city district of Pempelfort , runs through the Golzheim district as the main urban axis and ends in Stockum , a district with a villa-like suburban character. In the course of its course, Kaiserswerther Strasse shows various development phases, which exemplify the urban expansion of Düsseldorf from the early 20th century to the present.

Since the 1920s, Kaiserswerther Strasse has been one of the most important access roads to the event locations in the north of the city. Since the 1970s, these have been the exhibition grounds , the ESPRIT arena (1923 to 2002 the Rheinstadion ) and the airport . The traffic relief road has been the parallel Kennedydamm / Danziger Strasse expressway since the 1960s .

In addition to the adjacent buildings, which vary in their type, the street's equally varied uses give it its character. It leads through residential quarters from the Wilhelminian era, but is also the address of more than 120 established companies in the fashion industry. There are also numerous interest groups and companies as well as cultural institutions. The latter include the Nordpark and the Aquazoo .

history

From the beginning until 1933

The place name Golzheim was mentioned in the 11th century. At the point where Uerdinger and Kaiserswerther Strasse now cross, maps from the early 19th century show a small village settlement. A path led south towards Düsseldorf, which already defines the course of today's street.

In the 19th century, Düsseldorf grew so quickly that orderly urban planning became necessary. The urban expansion plan for around 600,000 inhabitants, designed by the city architect Buch in 1884/1885 and assessed by Josef Stübben , provided for a system of radial roads , including one that should lead to Kaiserswerth . The wide, dead straight streets sparked criticism from the citizens because they feared too much dust and traffic noise. As a result, the plan was changed in some places, including the layout of the future Kaiserswerther Strasse, which was planned to be narrower and gently curved in some places. A collection canal was planned under the street to carry the sewage from the higher parts of the city into the Rhine.

On June 22, 1895, the street named after its route from Düsseldorf in the direction of Kaiserswerth was inaugurated. The northern part from Klever Strasse was initially called Kaiserswerther Chaussee . During the National Socialist era, the part between houses 179–329 and 184–374 was named Richthofenstrasse after Manfred von Richthofen . Since October 1899 a small train has been running on Kaiserswerther Strasse, first to Kaiserswerth and later, since August 1900, to Duisburg . The area between Klever and Uerdinger Strasse was only sparsely developed at the beginning of the 20th century. Here were individual factories as well as some residential and commercial buildings. Some buildings, such as the B. the houses No. 152, 200 or 204. Of the remains of the former village of Golzheim is nowhere to be seen.

In the 1920s, building activity began in the large cities of the German Empire. From 1924, the western side of Kaiserswerther Strasse in the Golzheim area was built with large residential buildings in the style of New Building and Brick Expressionism, including two symmetrically designed residential high -rises at the intersection of Kaiserswerther Strasse and Uerdinger Strasse. For the time, these were very comfortable apartments with lifts and central heating. The apartment sizes of up to 300 m², some with separate servants' entrances, also suggest an upscale tenant clientele. The construction of this ensemble, which was called Haus Rheinpark , dragged on until 1929. The global economic crisis that began in 1929 then initially ended the further expansion of the road.

The time of National Socialism

Horse Tamer by Edwin Scharff at the entrance to North Park

With the GeSoLei 1926, Düsseldorf successfully continued its tradition of hosting large public exhibitions. In 1937, the National Socialists wanted to trump past successes with the propaganda exhibition Creative People . The former GeSoLei site seemed too small for that. The choice finally fell on an area on Kaiserswerther Straße, the site of Villa Leiffmann , which had been vacant since 1932 , and part of the Golzheimer Heide. In one and a half years of construction, the later Nordpark (entrance at number 380) as well as the National Socialist model settlements Schlageterstadt (after 1945 called Braune , then White and today Golzheimer Siedlung) and Wilhelm-Gustloff -siedlung (today Nordparkiedlung in Stockum ) were built along the Kaiserswerther Strasse that was converted here ). In 1934, the section of Kaiserswerther Straße, between today's Golzheimer Platz and Reeser Platz, was renamed Richthofenstraße .

The Nordpark is the only exhibition park that was created in the Third Reich and is still largely preserved to this day. On Reeser course is the 39th monument another testimony from the Nazi period, a monument to the fallen of the First World War the 39th infantry regiment . After the Second World War there were isolated protests, especially since soldiers' associations held celebrations in honor of the fallen here until the 1990s.

Albertus Magnus Church

Kaiserswerther Strasse itself was expanded widely and the tram tracks from Reeser Platz were widened to four lanes in order to cope with the expected onrush of visitors. The Joseph Chapel at the Uerdinger Strasse intersection also fell victim to this traffic planning in 1937. The small chapel had served the Golzheimers as a place of worship since 1660. The Albertus Magnus Church was built as a replacement in 1938/1939 . In view of the war preparations, the originally planned community center could not be completed at first, as only 2,000 kg of iron were allocated for the construction. The church itself was also a temporary solution that had to wait 35 years for its final completion.

Only the southern part of the street between Bankstrasse and Nordstrasse was affected by war damage , including the neo-Romanesque basilica of St. Adolfus, which was badly damaged. Golzheim and Stockum with the exhibition grounds and the National Socialist model settlements survived the bombing war unscathed.

The post-war period and the 1950s

The north park and large parts of the Golzheimer Heide were confiscated by the British occupying forces, which set up a headquarters here along Kaiserswerther Strasse. Downtown Düsseldorf was largely destroyed. Intact streets close to the city, which also had free construction areas, were interesting for companies and associations as well as for residential construction. In the early 1950s, several apartment blocks were built along the street, also in the northern area, as well as some new office buildings, such as the Drahthaus . The foundation for the Kaiserswerther Strasse office location was laid.

The development into a fashion location

Thanks to the Igedo fashion fair , Düsseldorf had developed into an order and information center for the German fashion industry since the 1950s. While the buyers of the retail trade in other countries ordered directly from the manufacturers' branches, the German order business was mainly processed at the Düsseldorf exhibition center . In 1983 the first 30 order rooms for fashion agencies and manufacturers (called showrooms within the branch) were built in a new building on Kaiserswerther Strasse 140-144. The demand for such showrooms was so great that hotel rooms and apartments were rented in the vicinity when the order was placed. In the opinion of the city of Düsseldorf - under the impression of the housing shortage in Düsseldorf at the time - there was a risk of an undesirable change of area. As a result, on December 16, 1993, a change ban was imposed on the western and predominantly residential part of the street. Nevertheless, in 1994 more than 100 showrooms were counted on Kaiserswerther Strasse in which around 500 collections were presented. On the part of Igedo, the showrooms were perceived as competition. In addition, the fashion companies were accused of misappropriating living space and causing traffic problems. Despite various measures on the part of the city of Düsseldorf to prevent the further settlement of fashion companies on Kaiserswerther Strasse, a large number of fashion companies from Germany and abroad continued to settle. In 1995 the former IBM branch in Düsseldorf was converted to showroom use and renamed Fashion Plaza . This was followed by the demolition of a large apartment block (houses 117–119) with inexpensive living space, which was replaced by an 8,500 m² office building, into which users from the fashion industry also finally moved. Ultimately, the development plan passed in 1996, which provided for a ban on showrooms, could no longer reverse the development. In 2003 the city of Düsseldorf made one last attempt to ban showrooms on a larger scale, but failed due to massive resistance from the fashion companies. In the meantime, the housing situation on Kaiserswerther Strasse had also eased and other showroom locations had also established themselves in the city area. For the 2008 winter season, 123 of the 800 or so showrooms in Düsseldorf were on Kaiserswerther Strasse and 98 others were in the immediate vicinity. The upscale genre predominated. Several times a year, parallel to the CPD fashion fair and the GDS shoe fair, order appointments take place on the street known as KWS within the industry , to which numerous buyers from Germany and abroad travel.

Course and street description

Karl-Arnold-Platz

The street begins in the Pempelfort district at an intersection with Nordstrasse , the main shopping street for the three districts of Derendorf , Golzheim and Pempelfort. From here, Kaiserswerther Strasse runs north as a two-lane side road to the Kennedydamm / Homberger Strasse intersection ( B 1 ). As part of the underground construction, tram operations were discontinued. Individual traffic from the city center is run parallel to Fischerstrasse.

From Klever Strasse , Kaiserswerther Strasse leads through the Golzheim district. From Homberger Straße it is planted on both sides with tall, old plane trees. The Düsseldorf tram also runs in the middle of the street . The street runs below the Theodor-Heuss-Brücke with connections via Uerdinger Straße. From Reeser Platz, the street is divided by a green strip on which the tram runs. In addition, the road widens to two lanes in each direction of travel. The street now looks very wide, as the buildings also recede from the pavement and are sometimes separated from it by a wide strip of greenery. The predominantly closed perimeter block development that characterizes the street up to this point also ends at this section .

The road surface now changes to cobblestone . This makes this area of ​​Kaiserswerther Straße the last section of a main road in Düsseldorf that is not paved. In interaction with the architecture of the north park and the adjacent settlements, which were built as part of the Reich Exhibition, the Creative People , the street here is an example of the architectural ideas of the late 1930s. Despite public protests against the noise caused by the interplay of cobblestones and heavy traffic, the city administration is sticking to the paving for reasons of unofficial ensemble protection . After about a kilometer, the road ends at the roundabout at Freiligrathplatz .

Development

St. Adolfus

In the southern area in Pempelfort there is a closed perimeter block development predominantly from the turn of the 19th to the 20th century. In Golzheim, the brick buildings of the Haus Rheinpark residential complex from the 1920s dominate the street scene on the western side of the street. As one of the oldest houses and as a relic of formerly village-like structures in Golzheim, there is also the Vionville house , which was built in 1893/1894.

Golzheimer Platz

On the opposite side of the street there are mainly office buildings from different epochs of the 20th century. A highlight in the street is Golzheimer Platz / Karl-Arnold-Platz . It opens up like a park to the Rhine in the west. In the east it is closed by today's Radisson SAS Hotel , a typical elongated rigid building block of the 1960s with ribbon windows. This is followed in the southern course of the street by a seven-storey, glazed, airy cube with a suggested inner courtyard, built in 2002–2003 as KAP 1 by the architects Petzinka , Pink and Partner . What follows is an important testimony to post-war office building architecture, highly regarded at the time and the basis for the subsequent worldwide success of its architects: the Drahthaus (house no. 137) built by Helmut Hentrich and Hans Heuser in 1951–1952 , planned and used for decades as the headquarters of a corporate association the wire industry. In front of the building is the larger than life bronze Standing Youth by Georg Kolbe , probably the last work of the sculptor and the only existing cast. Today, like many of the office buildings on the street, the wire house is used as a showroom for companies from the fashion industry. Right next to it (house no. 135) is an office building, the unusual facade design of which gives the impression of an Asian bamboo construction. The building was built in 1998/1999 in the retro style of the time by the architect Karl-Heinz Petzinka. The buildings adjoining to the south are good and still genuine examples of the architecture of the 1960s, 1970s and 1980s.

The Düsseldorf list of monuments identifies buildings under monument protection for Straße 16 . For some groups of buildings there is also ensemble protection .

Kaiserswerther Strasse 160 to 166

Between 1922 and 1924 the architect Heinrich Schell built a large four-story apartment block in the style of brick expressionism . Similar four-and-a-half-story buildings followed in 1924/1925 by the architects Fritz Becker and Erich Kutzner, and finally in 1927/1928 further north the Haus Rheinpark ensemble in a similar style, based on plans by the architect William Dunkel . The two eleven-storey high-rise apartment buildings at the Uerdinger Strasse intersection, which protrude over the maximum five-and-a-half-story group of buildings, are remarkable. These were the first residential buildings of this height in Düsseldorf, if not the first high-rise residential buildings in the city. At this point the intersection widens to a place where there are some shops for daily needs and a restaurant. The four-lane ramp of the Theodor-Heuss-Brücke with the B7 runs between the two residential towers at about the same height as the first floor. At the time of their planning, the two residential towers were planned as modern city ​​gates for a future Rhine bridge.

The buildings erected between 1922 and 1928 also influenced the architectural style of other houses from the 1950s. Numerous buildings with dark red clinker facades dominate the street in the entire southern Golzheim area over a length of around one kilometer. Opposite them, the six- story Four Elements office building with around 15,000 square meters of gross floor area was built by the architects Petzinka Pink Technological Architecture from 2006 to 2009 . The offset facade projections, different storey depths and building heights correspond to the listed building tower on the opposite side. The Haus Rheinpark ensemble, now a listed building, was extensively renovated by the architect Heinz Schmitz from the end of the 1980s and sold as part of the property.

traffic

Street with a listed cobblestone pavement level with Aquazoo / Nordpark
Light rail with its own track bed

In the 1930s, Kaiserswerther Straße fulfilled an important development function for the Schaffendes Volk exhibition. For this purpose, the existing track systems were expanded and extended to two pairs of tracks. This enabled parallel express traffic between Duisburg and Düsseldorf and, at the same time, frequent intervals between the city center and the exhibition grounds and the Rheinstadion further north. The construction of the New Trade Fair, which was handed over to its destination in 1971, created this need again. For operational reasons, however, this four-track section was reduced to two tracks at the end of the 1990s. At the Reeser Platz, Nordpark / Aquazoo and Messe Ost / Stockumer Kirchstraße stops, elevated platforms were built in the middle of the track .

Today the tram lines U 78 and U 79 serve the stops on this route.

There are long-term expansion plans for the southern section, which does not have its own track structure. These provide for the tunnel, which ends at the Kaiserswerther Strasse / Kennedydamm intersection, to be extended by 1.5 km to the north. The Kennedydamm stop, like the Theodor-Heuss-Brücke stop, would be replaced by an underground station. The Golzheimer Platz stop in between would be omitted without replacement. The subsequent tunnel ramp would be built in the area in front of the Reeser Platz stop, which has been expanded to include the tram.

A more up-to-date plan provides for the construction of a bypass around the Düsseldorf trade fair . For this purpose it is intended to set up a new line U 80. Their new route will be threaded above ground from Kaiserswerther Strasse at the level of the Aquazoo.

literature

  • Jürgen Wiener: The Gesolei and the Düsseldorf architecture of the 20s . JP Bachem, Cologne 2001, ISBN 3-7616-1445-4 .
  • Stefanie Schäfers: From the Werkbund to the four-year plan. The exhibition "Schaffendes Volk" Düsseldorf 1937. Droste, Düsseldorf 2001, ISBN 3-7700-3045-1 .

Web links

Commons : Kaiserswerther Straße (Düsseldorf)  - Collection of images, videos and audio files

Urban planning in general

Individual buildings

Individual evidence

  1. ^ Hugo Weidenhaupt: Brief history of the city of Düsseldorf. 9th edition, Triltsch, Düsseldorf 1993, ISBN 3-7998-0000-X , p. 196 (map from 1799)
  2. ^ Hermann Kleinfeld: Dusseldorf's streets and their names. Grupello, Düsseldorf 1996, ISBN 3-928234-36-6 .
  3. ^ Directory of the renamed streets: Kaiserswerther Strasse 179–329 and 184–374b, now Richthofenstrasse, in Düsseldorf address book, 1934
  4. ↑ Jörg Engelbrecht, Clemens von Looz-Corswarem (ed.): War and peace in Düsseldorf. Grupello, Düsseldorf 2004, ISBN 3-89978-003-5 , p. 223 ff.
  5. ^ Page of the Holy Family parish
  6. ↑ Falk Plan Düsseldorf with a representation of all partial and total destruction, 1st edition, Falkverlag, Hamburg 1949.
  7. ^ Christian greetings, Ingelore Pohl: The endogenous development potential of the fashion industry in the cities and regions of North Rhine-Westphalia. Institute for Spatial Planning at the University of Dortmund, Dortmund 1994.
  8. ↑ No actions against fashion agencies. In: Textil-Wirtschaft , No. 26 of June 30, 1994.
  9. ↑ Ludolf Schulte: "Fahnder" as a fashion buyer on the go. In: Rheinische Post from July 20, 1994.
  10. ^ Revolt of the noble tailors . In: Der Spiegel . No. 31 2003, ( Online - July 28, 2003 ).
  11. ↑ Steinbrück campaigns for fashion. In: NRZ from August 5, 2003.
  12. ↑ Online edition of the Igedo Fashion Fairs exhibition catalog: The Power of D., City Showrooms, Kaiserswerther Straße, Klartext - Das Klar'sche Textil Archive
  13. ↑ Kaiserswerther Strasse. Stadtspitze protects the cobblestones. In: Westdeutsche Zeitung of May 9, 2008, Düsseldorfer Nachrichten, p. 15.
  14. ^ Jörg Heimeshoff : Listed houses in Düsseldorf. Nobel, Essen 2001, ISBN 3-922785-68-9 , pp. 130ff.

Coordinates: 51 ° 14 ′ 55 "  N , 6 ° 45 ′ 58"  E

This version was added to the list of articles worth reading on July 1, 2008 .