Falkenhagener Feld

West Berlin (German: Berlin (West) or West-Berlin, German pronunciation: [ˈvɛstbɛʁˌliːn] (listen)) was a political enclave which comprised the western part of Berlin during the years of the Cold War. Although the legal status as a part of the Federal Republic of Germany was heavily disputed, West Berlin aligned itself politically in 1949 and after with it and was directly or indirectly represented in its federal institutions. West Berlin was formally controlled by the Western Allies and entirely surrounded by the Soviet-controlled East Berlin and East Germany. West Berlin had great symbolic significance during the Cold War, as it was widely considered by westerners an "island of freedom" and America's most loyal counterpart in Europe. It was heavily subsidised by West Germany as a "showcase of the West". A wealthy city, West Berlin was noted for its distinctly cosmopolitan character, and as a centre of education, research and culture. With about two million inhabitants, West Berlin had the largest population of any city in Germany during the Cold War era.West Berlin was 160 kilometres (100 mi) east and north of the Inner German border and only accessible by land from West Germany by narrow rail and highway corridors. It consisted of the American, British, and French occupation sectors established in 1945. The Berlin Wall, built in 1961, physically separated West Berlin from its East Berlin and East German surroundings until it fell in 1989. On 3 October 1990, the day Germany was officially reunified, East and West Berlin formally reunited, joined the Federal Republic as a city-state and, eventually, once again became the capital of Germany.

Wilhelmstadt (German pronunciation: [ˈvɪlhɛlmsˌʃtat] (listen)) is a German locality (Ortsteil) of Berlin in the borough (Bezirk) of Spandau.

Berlin-Spandau station is a Deutsche Bahn station in the Berlin district of Spandau on the south-western edge of the old town of Spandau. The railway junction station is one of the 80 stations classified by Deutsche Bahn as a category 2 station. It has the longest train shed (440 metres) in Germany. The high-traffic station with six platform tracks is a transfer point between long-distance passenger services—Intercity-Express (ICE), Intercity (IC) and EuroCity (EC)—and regional services (S-Bahn, Regionalbahn and Regional-Express). It also provides connections to the inner city by the public transport services operated by the Berliner Verkehrsbetriebe: buses and U-Bahn line U7 at the adjacent Rathaus Spandau station. The Berlin–Hamburg railway from the northwest and the Berlin–Lehrte railway from the west join together west of the station and the combined lines, after passing through the station, runs over a bridge over the Havel and continues to the east and then runs jointly with the Ringbahn (Ring Railway) for some distance on its way to Berlin Hauptbahnhof. The line running from the station was initially parallel with the Spandau Suburban Line of the S-Bahn, which connects with the Berlin Stadtbahn to reach Berlin Hauptbahnhof by a different route. Spandau station is also the terminus of the S-Bahn line, although there is a proposal to extend it into the Havelland. The Bahnhof Spandau and Rathaus Spandau bus stops in front of the station entrance are served by more than ten regional bus lines and city bus lines and they constitute the most important bus node in Berlin after Hardenbergplatz next to Berlin Zoologischer Garten station.

Spandau (German: [ˈʃpandaʊ̯] (listen)) is the westernmost of the 12 boroughs (Bezirke) of Berlin, situated at the confluence of the Havel and Spree rivers and extending along the western bank of the Havel. It is the smallest borough by population, but the fourth largest by land area.

The Rathaus Spandau (German: [ˈʁaːtˌhaʊ̯s ˈʃpandaʊ̯] (listen)) is the town hall of the borough of Spandau in the western suburbs of Berlin, the capital city of Germany. It was designed by Heinrich Reinhardt and Georg Süßenguth, and was built between 1910 and 1913. Until 1920, when Spandau was incorporated into Greater Berlin, it was the city hall of the independent city of Spandau. The Rathaus Spandau is situated on Carl-Schurz-Straße at the southern edge of the Altstadt Spandau. The Rathaus Spandau station, on U-Bahn line , and the Berlin-Spandau station, served by S-Bahn, regional and intercity railway routes, are both situated nearby.

Rathaus Spandau (Spandau Town Hall) is one of the western termini of Berlin U-Bahn line U7 (the other one being Rudow). It was opened on 1 October 1984 with the line's extension from Rohrdamm to Rathaus Spandau. The station takes its name from the nearby Rathaus Spandau, the historic city hall of Spandau. Close to the U-Bahn station Rathaus Spandau is the Berlin-Spandau station of the Berlin S-Bahn line S5 and the Deutsche Bahn for regional and intercity transport. The next station on the U7 line is Altstadt Spandau.The station was built in a box under a cover in order to minimise the disturbance of surface traffic. With its two island platforms, the station, which was designed by Rainer G. Rümmler, has almost monumental dimensions. It has a big hall with high ceilings, much light and 64 lamps, columns with black granite and a parquet floor like floor. The southern end of its platforms are spanned by a gallery for the movement of passengers to the surface and from which the entire station can be seen. The U-Bahn station also includes a signal control centre for the line to Paulsternstraße. U-Bahn line U7 uses the inner tracks, which are built for large profile trains, while the track beds of the outer tracks, which are built for the operation of small profile trains on a planned extension of the U-Bahn line U2, which currently runs only as far as Ruhleben, are currently empty. Uniquely for the Berlin U-Bahn, this line would run to the left of the platforms to improve interchanges for the planned extensions of the U7 to Staaken and the U2 to Falkenhagener Feld. An extension of the U7 south to Heerstraße is currently being planned, with a projected completion date in the mid-2030s. In 2021, the 4.26km, 5-station extension was projected to cost €578 million. Although the station is very close to Spandau S-Bahn station, it has kept its name. Nevertheless, Berliner Verkehrsbetriebe buses always show the destination as S+U Rathaus Spandau, but the S-Bahn station is only signed as Spandau.

Spandau Prison was located in the borough of Spandau in western Berlin. It was originally a military prison, but became a proto-concentration camp under the Nazis. After the war, it held seven top Nazi leaders convicted in the Nuremberg trials. It was constructed in 1876 and demolished in August 1987 to prevent it from becoming a neo-Nazi shrine after the death of its last prisoner, Rudolf Hess, who had died from suicide aged 93. The site was later rebuilt as a shopping centre for the British forces stationed in Germany.

The former Britannia Centre Spandau, previously known as British Forces Families Centre (BFFC), was built in 1990 by the PSA for the British Authorities on the site where Spandau Prison was once located. Britannia Centre Spandau centralised the main shopping, welfare, employment and broadcasting facilities for the British military community in Berlin. The Britannia Centre consisted of a new shopping and cinema complex, as well as five existing and completely refurbished two and three-story buildings. It was opened in phases between September 1990 and mid-1991. Its buildings are located at the junction of Wilhelmstraße and Gatower Straße next to the former Smuts Barracks in the Wilhelmstadt in Spandau.

Spandau (German: [ˈʃpandaʊ̯] (listen)) is a locality (Ortsteil) of Berlin in the homonymous borough (Bezirk) of Spandau. The historic city is situated, for the most part, on the western banks of the Havel river. As of 2020 the estimated population of Spandau was 39,653.

The Karlslust dance hall fire (also known as Loebel's Restaurant fire) occurred on 8 February 1947 in Hakenfelde, a locality of Spandau in what was then the British sector of Berlin. With its death toll of 80 to 88, it marks possibly the worst fire disaster in Germany since the Second World War. The death toll is today considered to be 81: 80 guests and the owner of the restaurant, Julius Loebel, who died while attempting to save a cashbox.

The Bullengraben is a moat in Berlin’s glacial valley, which has been in use since the 7th century. It is located in the Berlin district of Spandau and runs from the old village center of Staaken eastwards for about five kilometers to the Havel River, into which it flows north of the Spandau castle rampart. Used for centuries to improve the wetlands, since the 1960s it has been used as a drainage ditch to collect rainwater from the surrounding neighborhoods of Spandau. The development of the areas around the Bullengraben reflects part of Spandau's settlement history. Between 2004 and 2007, DB ProjektBau rehabilitated a ditch that had been canalized in the 1960s and 1970s but had later been neglected. This rehabilitation was conducted as part of a replacement measure. Parallel to the moat, the Deutsche Bahn subsidiary created the 200-meter-wide Bullengraben/Lindenufer green corridor with playgrounds and sports fields, recreational areas, bridges, footbridges, and a path that leads to Elsflether Weg. The Bullengrabenweg, one of Berlin's top 20 green paths, is open to pedestrians, cyclists, and skaters. The path is approximately four meters wide and has a smooth asphalt covering. The last section of the path includes the Burgwallgraben and a 100-metre-long promenade along the Havel. Additionally, biotopes located within the green corridor, such as the Stieglake and Wiesen basins, along with the ditches leading to them, such as the Egelpfuhlgraben, have undergone restoration. In 2008, Deutsche Bahn received the Gustav Meyer Prize for designing the entire park. This award is given every two years since 1995 to recognize excellent planning of public green spaces and parks. The prize bears the name of Johann Heinrich Gustav Meyer, Berlin's first municipal horticultural director.

Altstadt Spandau is the historic centre (old town) of the Spandau borough in the western suburbs of Berlin, situated on the right bank of the Havel river by its confluence with the Spree tributary. It arose near the site of a former Slavic gord during the German eastward expansion (Ostsiedlung) in the early 13th century. A castle at Spandowe, erected on a Havel island to secure the eastern borderlands of the Margraviate of Brandenburg, was already documented in an 1197 deed issued by the Ascanian margrave Otto II. The city itself was first mentioned on 7 March 1232, when the Spandau citizens were vested with further privileges by the Brandenburg margraves John I and Otto III. A first church is documented in 1240; the present-day Saint Nicholas Church was built in the late 14th century. It became the initial point of the Protestant Reformation in Brandenburg, when on 1 November 1539 Elector Joachim II Hector converted to Lutheranism and celebrated the first communion under both kinds here. A Jewish community in Spandau existed since the 13th century, a synagogue is documented since 1342. The Hohenzollern elector also had the city protected from attacks by the Spandau Citadel, a Renaissance fortress erected at the site of the medieval castle from about 1560 onwards. The walled-up Altstadt quarter became the nucleus of the larger Spandau Fortress, built under Prussian rule after the Napoleonic Wars in the early 19th century, also a centre of the German arms industry. Today the Altstadt quarter is served by Rathaus Spandau and Altstadt Spandau stations on the Berlin U-Bahn line . Berlin-Spandau station, served by S-Bahn, regional and intercity railway routes, is situated to the south of the Altstadt.