Luisenstädtischer Kanal

The shipping canal (1845-1926 )

Work on the canal began in 1845, intensified as an emergency project of the 1848 Revolution, and opened to traffic on May 15, 1852. The canal was mainly used for the transport of building materials to the new city expansion area and was supposed to take over the delivery traffic for the factories that were being built. Fruit and vegetable farmers from the Spreewald used its docks as floating marketplaces.
The Angel Basin formed the "forecourt" for St. Michael's Church (1851-61), built by architect August Soller, which served as the second Catholic church in Berlin, primarily as the Garrison Church, and whose crowning angel figure gave the basin its name.
The canal lost its importance as a transfer point for building materials for the expansion of the Köpenick field after the turn of the 19th to the 20th century. Lack of use and technical difficulties - the gradient between the Spree and the Landwehr Canal was too low to ensure sufficient flow, resulting in algae growth, stench and mosquito infestation - prompted the canal to be filled in. From 1926, the excavated earth from the new underground line between Gesundbrunnen and Neukölln was used to backfill the canal.

The green corridor from the water (1928-1945 )

Planning for the green corridor was entrusted to the Berlin city garden director Erwin Barth (1880-1933) in 1928, in cooperation with the horticultural departments of the Mitte and Kreuzberg districts, which were formed in 1920.
Barth succeeded in "lifting" Lenné's canal into a sequence of decorative, educational and play gardens by laying them out between the canal walls one metre above the level of the former water level. The waterway was still commemorated by the Angel Basin, now an ornamental pond, and the bridge in the course of Waldemar Street.
Inspired by the Taj Mahal, Barth initially planned an "Indian pond" with palm trees, exotic plants and elephant statues for the Angel Basin, which was to be fed by the warm waste water from the ice factory in Köpenicker Strasse, then a public bath, but this failed due to the resistance of the Catholic public.
The Indian Fountain in the adjacent Rose Garden alone still bears witness to his visions. In the Luisenstadt, which was poor in public open spaces, the Engelbecken became a popular place for all kinds of leisure activities such as ice skating, splashing around in the "water castle" and carp fishing.

Post-war development (1945-1992 )

The green corridor, which was barely damaged during the war, was partially filled in with rubble from the heavily destroyed Luisenstadt in the 1950s and redesigned in the style of the time. Due to the division of the city, the districts of Kreuzberg and Mitte were separated in 1961.
The garden sections located in the East Berlin district of Mitte and the Engelbecken were completely filled in and developed into border fortifications. In the process, all the rows of trees lining the former canal were cut down. On the West Berlin side, between Urbanhafen and Waldemarbrücke, the green corridor eked out an existence in the shadow of the Wall and was redesigned in the 1980s in connection with the plans for the International Building Exhibition (IBA) according to designs by Baller, Luz, and Hanke. In the process, however, the historical design principles and thus also the Barthian low-lying position of the canal gardens were no longer incorporated.

to the stories back to overview

1. The shipping canal (1845-1926)
2. The green corridor from the water (1928-1945)
3. Post-war development (1945-1992)