East / West Berlin Contrasts, April 1990. (1)

Some primarily U-Bahn (underground railway / subway) related views filmed in Berlin in April 1990, which was after the wall had been opened but when the city was still divided.

1) Alexanderplatz was the focal point for the Eastern part of Berlin, and here we see some large & small profile U-Bahn trains (note the 'door closing' lights and bells) plus the main Centrum department store and a shop selling 'Western' products for people with 'hard' currency (ie: £, $, DM, etc).

Not filmed (to avoid possible arrest) were signs inside Centrum in German, French, English and Russian saying that many of the goods on display could only be sold to people with Berlin Residency Cards (ie: people from the part of Berlin in the former DDR / GDR).

There is also a ride inside a small profile U-Bahn train.

2) Wittenbergplatz was part of the focal point for the Western part of Berlin, and here we see a gift from London Transport, some small profile U-Bahn trains (note the lack of any type of 'door closing' alarms) plus some internal & external views of the restored station booking hall and the nearby large KaDeWe department store.

3) A ride through some closed stations inside a large profile U-Bahn train on line U8.

After the building of the wall in 1961 the U8 only carried West Berliners, linking suburbs to the north and the south of the city via Alexanderplatz but with the stations in the Eastern controlled part of Berlin being sealed so that no-one could enter / leave them and armed guards on the station platforms to kill anyone who tried to board a passing train.

At the time of filming one station (Rosenthaler Platz) had already been reopened, but the other 5 (on U8) remained closed, with the platforms dimly lit, and trains travelling through without stopping.

4) A photograph taken in December 1989 of a typical U-Bahn station in East Berlin which because the trains which served it ran through to West Berlin was closed.

Category:

Travel & Events

Tags:

• Berlin
• U-Bahn
• UBahn
• Alexanderplatz
• Centrum
• Wittenbergplatz
• KaDeWe
• train
• underground
• railway
• subway
• railroad

[MaestroFire]

Why did they closed all those stations in east-Berlin? I went to Berlin a year ago, but the difference is still big, ariund Alexanderplatz you have still many of those big, old building that look like that they can collapse any moment, and they call it houses.

They could better bring these down and build new, modern and beautiful buildings, or bringing old buildings from the great Prussian times back, wich were destroyed in WW2.

You think 20 years is enough to recover, but it is not enough.

[citytransportinfo]

@MaestroFire A city will never ever recover exactly as things were before. Sentimentality builds up for life as it was in the 'intervening' period.

For people born after the war who have only known the city as it was in the divided era so destroying everything they knew and replacing it with what their parents knew is not at all a welcome prospect.

Simon

[citytransportinfo]

There could be a VERY good reason for this - at some stage some former Berlin trains were sent to N. Korea. I think these were large profile U-Bahn trains.

[EvanC0912]

mm.. why did the wittenbergplatz station sign use the london underground's style sign?

[citytransportinfo]

@EvanC0912 It was a gift from London Transport - I think they gave it in 1968.

[EvanC0912]

@citytransportinfo

ooh.. then it laid on the british sector i assume..

you got a great recording btw.. this is a very historical recording..

were you in a travel to germany at that time?

[citytransportinfo]

@EvanC0912 I'm not quite sure what you mean by 'in a travel to Germany' ...

my visit to Berlin in April 1990 was specially to film things which I knew would soon be changing, such as the closed stations in East Berlin which were served by West Berlin U-Bahn and S-Bahn trains, the Intershop shops, the historic West Berlin tram which used a closed part of the U-Bahn and the M-Bahn.

Simon

[monidatta]

also, hat einer bock bisschen zu quatschen ihr werdets warscheinlich nicht bereuen

[DanilaChek]

@MaestroFire some of this big building you've seen around the Alexanderplatz were built before the war, like two near the S-bahn station

[FalconSupreme]

The shop only for people with "hard currency" KaDeWe ! (Kaufhaus Des Westens)

[DanielVoydd]

Great video. Very insightful.

[MaestroFire]

@MegaDjhan But some are just...... Too ugly to look to.

[MegaDjhan]

@MaestroFire well those communist blocks are historical. I think its good that they keep them so that we dont forget about the communism

[alanheath]

@MaestroFire As a former developer I can assure you that will not work. The blocks around Alexanderplatz house huge amounts of people. Maybe they would agree to moving out for a couple of years whilst their new homes were being built but then who would pay for it? And given the huge amount of homes to be constructed, the new buildings would look like the old. The only solution to this problem - if it is a problem - is to clad the buildings in some way as many have been in the former DDR.

[MaestroFire]

@alanheath No not in that way; First built flats outside the center, send the people there and than rebuilt.

[alanheath]

Another brilliant film! I was also there in April 1990 - I spent one day in East Berlin. Unfortunately that was before I was filming everything and all I have now is my memory ...

My biggest regret is not having recorded more of my life and some of the interesting places I was in in the 1980s.

[alanheath]

@MaestroFire How would you feel if someone came along and said that you could not live in the flat you had been in all your life because someone decided that they were going to 'bring back buildings from the great Prussian times'? Something tells me you would not be too pleased.

I also doubt that they are about to collapse at any moment.

[NotesCollector]

The Berlin Wall

1961-2011