Berlin, a mecca of culture and creativity

[SkyBridge]

So a Munich II? That's very hot...

[CaptainJason]

Seriously? I was in Berlin at the start of September and it totally blew me away as a city. Are you seriously suggesting you turn it into some sort of German version of central London. i.e. devoid of any form of culture and completely dead out of office hours. The grit is one of the things that makes Berlin wonderful. I would say that it is one of the greatest and most cities in Europe. Loved every inch of what I saw! Apart from the O2 monstrosity!

Gentrification is a load of bollocks and would turn Berlin into your average Europian City.

[Chrissib]

Well, a Munich II would of course be the ideal version, but I'd already content with a Berlin that is financial self-sufficient and doesn't need to steal the wealth of other cities where the people are working and not parteying the whole day.

[SkyBridge]

I'm with Captain Jason on this one and not Chrissib. Munich was one of the most boring places on earth I visited.

[Suburbanist]

Originally Posted by CaptainJason

Seriously? I was in Berlin at the start of September and it totally blew me away as a city. Are you seriously suggesting you turn it into some sort of German version of central London. i.e. devoid of any form of culture and completely dead out of office hours. The grit is one of the things that makes Berlin wonderful. I would say that it is one of the greatest and most cities in Europe. Loved every inch of what I saw! Apart from the O2 monstrosity!

Grit is a form of urban cancer to be eradicated, like panhandling, graffiti/tagging, pickpocketing, mugging, carjacks, illegal housing, illegal trash dumping, squatting. It most be fought like it were the pest.

This being said, the question is not being dead or not after hours. Even so because there are outlying business districts accommodating many offices anyway. That is not a risk to Berlin. The question is just to crack down with a heavy handed, law-and-order approach over places that are out of line with what one would expect in terms of neatness, cleanliness and organization for a German city. It is about "taming" districts that now live as if some rules (and believe the Berlin Länder has plenty of them) didn't apply to certain places.

You can have a lot of after-work-hours activity without having whole streets filled with graffiti, or illegal residences in former SED office buildings no one wants to redevelop, or illegal bars or venues opened on residential-only designated streets (which ends up driving residents who don't like the bars but have every single right to live there moving out because they can't cope with the noise/crowds).

This is like the dark side of Berlin, it doesn't fit withe the monumentality of approaching the Brandenburg Tör from the Tiegarten, for instance. Or the slim, modern buildings of Postdam Platz (a modern place with plenty of nighttime businesses going on as well).

But there is hope IMO. In the 1980s, London was a kinda bankrupt city, and it had many areas that suffered from grit, grim and decay. Now, these are some of the most sought-after areas in London, all the grit and grim was cleaned up , illegal uses of buildings was drastically reduced and graffiti, once a problem of epic proportions, was drastically reduced in such areas as well.

What I can't ever accept is the idea that dirt, graffiti, unruly behavior on streets, bars on basements ignoring fire hazard regulations etc. have any, ever a place in Europe. They don't - even in Berlin.

Gentrification is a load of bollocks and would turn Berlin into your average Europian City.

If it is maket-driven, there is no problem. But Berlin has a huge (said to be around 300.000) surplus of housing units, mostly commieblocks that are not attractive these days. So because there is so much housing available in Berlin for relatively easy conversion, it is unlikely the place will experiment the classic gentrification process in the near term.

[hmueller2]

Originally Posted by Chrissib

Some districts of Berlin truly are a shame for the city and the country, but I am glad that rents and prices explode all over Berlin, driving out undesireable elements. My hope for Berlin is that it gets rid of that poor and sexy image and starts getting the most advanced, cleanest and richest city in Germany once again.

Berlin should start to get rid of it's communist rubbish buildings and replace them with dense and packed residential and office areas. Narrowing the streets and building on unnecessary green space on wide streets will give life back to Berlin, after it was raped by the Nazis, the WWII bombings and then the communists in the east and leftist urban renewers in the west, who replaced good buildings of the 1871-1914 period with commieblocks and unnecessary greenery.

no way this is gonna happen in the next 50 years
in terms of economic power berlin and the whole brandenburg area will always lag behind south germany for example.
germany itself is a very diverse country. the mentality, the history and the idiosyncrasy of each region is so different.
it's like saying that greece should become the economic powerhouse of europe.


btw: just take a look how different berlin was before ww2.

[SkyBridge]

I detest the idea that a city should be a 'whole'. A city should be a lot of things. Monumental, gritty, rich, poor, open, dense, etc.

[Jonesy55]

Originally Posted by CaptainJason

Seriously? I was in Berlin at the start of September and it totally blew me away as a city. Are you seriously suggesting you turn it into some sort of German version of central London. i.e. devoid of any form of culture and completely dead out of office hours. The grit is one of the things that makes Berlin wonderful. I would say that it is one of the greatest and most cities in Europe. Loved every inch of what I saw! Apart from the O2 monstrosity!

Gentrification is a load of bollocks and would turn Berlin into your average Europian City.

Central London is devoid of culture and dead outside office hours?? Are you serious?

Perhaps Canary Wharf is like that but most parts of Central London are not at all.

[Wunderknabe]

Originally Posted by Suburbanist

But Berlin has a huge (said to be around 300.000) surplus of housing units, mostly commieblocks that are not attractive these days. So because there is so much housing available in Berlin for relatively easy conversion, it is unlikely the place will experiment the classic gentrification process in the near term.

Thats not true. Actually Berlin experiences a shortage of housing and more and more residential projects are popping out. The vacancy rate of flats is 1-2%.

[Jonesy55]

So how come housing is so cheap there?

[DiggerD21]

Originally Posted by Jonesy55

So how come housing is so cheap there?

Probably because the average income is lower than in other big german cities. So, while there is the demand for housing, it has to be cheap enough to those who demand it. And these are: students, "working poor" (to which a large part of the creative workers belong) and people being on welfare.

I don't like Suburbanists idea of making everything conform to his idea of the ideal city. Sorry to say, but his ideas sound for me like one from a fascist. Berlin is big enough to offer space for various different lifestyles. A crackdown on crime (like burning down cars or illegal graffiti) should be done of course.

[PadArch]

Originally Posted by Jonesy55

Central London is devoid of culture and dead outside office hours?? Are you serious?

Perhaps Canary Wharf is like that but most parts of Central London are not at all.

this guy (not you jonesy i'm referrnig to capt jason) clearly doesn't know anything about central london, and clearly doesn't know anything about TRUE urban grit.

[Chrissib]

Originally Posted by hmueller2

no way this is gonna happen in the next 50 years
in terms of economic power berlin and the whole brandenburg area will always lag behind south germany for example.
germany itself is a very diverse country. the mentality, the history and the idiosyncrasy of each region is so different.
it's like saying that greece should become the economic powerhouse of europe.

Well, then you forgot that until 25 years ago, Bavaria was a poor state compared to Germany. Thanks to sound economic policies, Bavaria rised in the late 80s and 90s to one of the richest states in Germany. Same with Hessen: 40 years ago mere average, and since 1990 one of the richest states in Germany. I hope that Berlin's mentality will change because of the ever rising real estate prices and the changing government (the communists had been kicked out), and I think it's possible to repair this city.

[PadArch]

Originally Posted by SkyBridge

I detest the idea that a city should be a 'whole'. A city should be a lot of things. Monumental, gritty, rich, poor, open, dense, etc.

I have to say I detest the idea that people should be poor. And why should a city be poor? So that you can visit and say oh look how interesting and edgy this poor gritty area is? What about the miserable people who live in that area?

[Jonesy55]

Originally Posted by DiggerD21

Probably because the average income is lower than in other big german cities. So, while there is the demand for housing, it has to be cheap enough to those who demand it. And these are: students, "working poor" (to which a large part of the creative workers belong) and people being on welfare.

True, but I've heard that housing in Berlin can be as cheap as housing in Warsaw or Riga. Maybe Berliners have lower incomes than other German big cities but surely not lower than EE capitals?

[hmueller2]

of course you are right in terms of the history.
even saxonia is doing really well today unlike 15-20 years ago.
it is right that you can archive alot in 20 years, but i still see no reason why the financial centre of germany (frankfurt) or the industry (south germany,nrw) should move to berlin oder brandenburg.
berlin has to find their own business model and in my opinion this will be tourism, governance, advertising/creative industry, start-ups and so on.
there are alot of opportunities for the city and the infrastructure is getting better and better (new airport f.e.)

housing:
well, housing is more or less cheap all over germany.
even in munich, which is the most expensive city in germany, housing is much cheaper than in london. i don't really know why.

[Jonesy55]

Well London is also 2-3x as expensive as other UK cities, its an anomaly driven by planning restrictions/low construction levels at a time of rapid population growth plus demand from rich foreigners wanting somewhere to put their money.

[DiggerD21]

Originally Posted by Jonesy55

True, but I've heard that housing in Berlin can be as cheap as housing in Warsaw or Riga. Maybe Berliners have lower incomes than other German big cities but surely not lower than EE capitals?

Renting a flat in Berlin can be even as cheap as renting a flat in Wroclaw, Poznan, Gdansk or Krakow. But as HMueller already said, Germany as a whole has lower rent prices than other countries.

And as for income: the capitals in EE are by far the cities with the highest average salaries in their countries. Berlin in Germany is by far not.

[Suburbanist]

Originally Posted by hmueller2

well, housing is more or less cheap all over germany.
even in munich, which is the most expensive city in germany, housing is much cheaper than in london. i don't really know why.

there are some explanations. According to our real estate professor here at the University, in a seminar held couple months ago, two of the main reasons are:

(1) lack of fiscal incentives (like extensive mortgage deduction) for people to buy houses at any cost

(2) the German Central Bank has stronger regulations regarding mortgage, making it less attractive for banks to finance 2nd, 3rd homes or corporate investment portfolio.

===================

As for people form elsewhere in Germany looking down on Berlin, I think it is the same as in Italy, where the major financial/industrial center is not Rome, but Milan. But the German case might be worse because there are three metro areas more populated than Berlin, so it is just the 4th German metro area.

Incidentally, I have a good friend from Wiesbaden who thinks the German capital should had changed from Bonn... to Frankfurt, not Berlin lol.

[hmueller2]

yeah
well, in frankfurts "paulskirche" 1848 the first "german" free elected parliament took place.
after ww2 there were 4 cities up to be elected the (west)german capital:
bonn, frankfurt, stuttgart and kassel.
the vote was very tight and it seemed that frankfurt would win. but in the end bonn won due to some politcal tactis of the parties.

another reason for the cheap housing might be the "rent-laws" in germany. as a tenant you usually have more rights than a landlord.
so tenants are very well protected by the law and the tenant unions.