Höhenberg sports park

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Höhenberg sports park
Main stand of the stadium
Main stand of the stadium
Earlier names

Airport stadium

Data
place Höhenberger Ring 51103 Cologne-Höhenberg , Germany
GermanyGermany
Coordinates 50 ° 56 '42.6 "  N , 7 ° 1' 49.5"  E Coordinates: 50 ° 56 '42.6 "  N , 7 ° 1' 49.5"  E
owner City of Cologne
operator Sports facilities GmbH Cologne
start of building 1931
Renovations 2011, 2012, 2019
Extensions 2012 ( floodlight system )
surface Natural grass
capacity 10,001 places
Societies)

The Höhenberg Sports Park is a sports facility in the Merheimer Heide in the Höhenberg district of Cologne on the right bank of the Rhine . The football stadium belonging to the facility is the home ground of the FC Viktoria Köln football club and the American football team of the Cologne Crocodiles . The sports facility currently offers 10,001 places.

The attachment

The first sports facility was opened in August 1921. The "VfR Stadium" built by VfR Köln 04 was designed as a pure football stadium and held 30,000 spectators. As part of the green belt expansion, the stadium was redesigned between 1929 and 1931 into an athletics stadium with a 100-meter running track on one side and the capacity was reduced to 18,000 seats. The reopening as "Sportpark Höhenberg" took place on September 20, 1931 in front of 8,000 spectators with a friendly match between VfR and Schalke 04. There was a seating grandstand for the first time in 1969, when a covered tubular steel grandstand was set up for around 1,200 spectators. Shortly afterwards, the back straight, which, like the rest of the stadium, consisted only of grass walls, was secured with standing trusses. This reduced the capacity to 12,000. From the end of the 1980s, a new grandstand for 3,000 spectators was built and the back straight was reinforced. To make room for the new grandstand, the running track was removed and the playing field moved towards the back straight. Since then, as when it opened in 1921, it has been a pure football stadium with 15,000 seats. The curves, which are still unpaved, are currently not used as an auditorium.

The sports complex has an artificial turf field and a tennis facility with six courts. In the 1990s the stadium was sometimes called the airport stadium , as the main sponsor of the then regional division SCB Preußen Köln, Flughafen Köln / Bonn GmbH , had acquired the naming rights. Although the company was again the main sponsor of the successor club FC Viktoria Köln between 2011 and 2015, it was not renamed again. The operator of the facility is Sportstätten GmbH Cologne . In 2011 the stadium was renovated for the North Rhine-Westphalia League . From May 2012, the back straight was renewed and a floodlight system was installed to make the stadium suitable for the regional league . According to the operator, the total costs amount to around 1.5 million euros.

After Viktoria rose to the 3rd division in the 2019/20 season , the stadium was expanded to the required number of 10,001 seats with additional grandstands .

Immediately to the south is the club's own facility of TuS Köln rrh . with two soccer fields, one of which is surrounded by a plastic track, and several tennis courts. Although the facility is spatially part of the Höhenberg sports park, it is often not included because of the other owner.

use

The stadium is the home ground of FC Viktoria Köln. In addition, almost all of the previous clubs played at least temporarily in the Höhenberg sports park. During the Confederation Cup in 2005 and the World Cup in 2006 , the national teams of Tunisia , Japan and France used the sports park for training sessions.

At least one international rugby union match has taken place at Sportpark Höhenberg every year since 2016 . On March 19, 2016 , the international match between Germany and Spain took place in the stadium of the sports park as part of the European Nations Cup 2014-2016 , the European championship in rugby union . The sold out game in front of 6,214 spectators ended in a 17:17 draw. On March 11, 2017, as part of the Rugby Europe International Championships 2016-2017 , the German national rugby team played another international match against Spain, in which Spain prevailed with 32:15. As part of the Rugby Europe International Championships 2017-2018 , the German national rugby team finally met Russia on March 18, 2018 . In front of around 2,600 spectators, however, the game was lost at 3:57. Germany last played against Spain on March 17, 2019 as part of the Rugby Europe International Championships 2018–2019 , but lost the game again at 10:33. RSV Köln has been responsible for hosting the international rugby union matches since 2016 .

reachability

The Höhenberg sports park is located on Frankfurter Strasse, Bundesstrasse 8 . About 900 m away there is a driveway to the B 55a, which after one kilometer leads to the Köln-Ost motorway junction . The Höhenberg Frankfurter Straße stop of tram line 1 and bus routes 151/152 is only 300 m away from the sports park.

Awards

The sports facility was awarded the international architecture prize of the International Olympic Committee and the International Association for Sports and Leisure Facilities eV - in short: the IOC / IAKS Award - in 1993.

Web links

Commons : Sportpark Höhenberg  - Collection of images, videos and audio files

Individual evidence

  1. ↑ Höhenberg Sports Park. In: viktoria1904.de. FC Viktoria Köln , accessed on May 29, 2019 .
  2. ↑ a b Stadium in Sportpark Höhenberg - Cologne-Höhenberg , europlan-online.de, accessed on July 18, 2019
  3. ↑ a b Green light: Viktoria Köln is allowed to play on Höhenberg , liga3-online.de, accessed on July 18, 2019
  4. ↑ Main sponsor for Viktoria ( Memento from February 6, 2013 in the web archive archive.today )
  5. ↑ Michael Oer: This is how Viktoria plans Cologne after the rise. In: liga3-online.de. May 21, 2019, accessed May 29, 2019 .
  6. ↑ Last hurdle cleared: Viktoria Köln stays in Höhenberg. In: stadionwelt.de. June 14, 2019, accessed June 14, 2019 .
  7. ↑ ENC 2016: DRV XV achieves EM relegation after a draw against Spain ( Memento from March 22, 2016 in the Internet Archive )
  8. ^ Bernhard Krebs: Sportpark Höhenberg damper for the German rugby selection in Cologne. In: rundschau-online.de. Kölnische Rundschau , March 13, 2017, accessed on May 29, 2019 .
  9. ↑ Stadium - Our venue in Cologne-Höhenberg ( Memento from May 14, 2012 in the Internet Archive )