Field Trip Highlights at the World Heritage Site „Zeche Zollverein” (in English)
Responsible: Caren Heidemann, City of Essen
Dr. Elke Hochmuth, University Duisburg-Essen, Focus Urban Systems
General
„High-tech instead of coal furnaces” – six field-trips in the Ruhr metropolis are available in the context of the conference. Participants experience the Ruhr metropolis and all its facets in an action- and knowledge-oriented manner. The challenges of living in a metropolis discussed during the conference will be vividly demonstrated to the participants.
The Ruhr area is an industrial area of 4.400 km² north of the river Ruhr, after which the area was named. More than 5 million people live in this urban agglomeration centre today. Cities interconnect, merge to a single giant metropolis – the Ruhr Metropolis.
The Ruhr area has changed considerably during the last 30 to 40 years. Having been an inhospitable mining region during the 1960s, it has now transformed into impressive urban, natural and cultural landscapes. Also, it has become a creative site for services and high-tech industry.
Old industrial plots in the Ruhr area have been assigned new and modern uses in a unique way. From 1989 to 1999, this face-lift was fostered significantly by a development program established by the federal state of North Rhine-Westphalia: the Internationale Bauausstellung Emscher Park (IBA). It still gives impulses with new ideas and projects for a whole region. Aim of this development program was to achieve a greater quality of living and housing for the citizens. It relied on architectural, town planning, social and ecological measures that provided the basis for the economic transition in an old industrial area. Roughly two and a half billion Euro have been invested in the region so far. Industrial wasteland from former mines, cokeries and steel mills has been preserved as industrial monuments and new possibilities for their uses have been developed. Examples for IBA projects are the Emscher landscape park, the Gasometer Oberhausen, the Bottrop Tetraeder, the Duisburg inner harbour, the Küppersbusch estate and many more.
The recently awarded distinction „Cultural Capital of Europe 2010” for the whole Ruhr area has even enforced the positive developments of IBA – in 2010, the Ruhr Metropolis became the Cultural Metropolis Ruhr.
The exciting field-trips offered here will visit both the mentioned IBA projects as well as technological highlights of the business location Ruhr Metropolis. Together with our competent hosts you will explore (during full- or half-day trips).
- transformation of industrial wasteland to modern technology, housing and cultural sites,
- the structural change from coal, iron and steel industry to service and information society,
- how former industrial monuments are put to new use and are now perceived in a new way.
In addition, each field-trip will give you the opportunity to view the Ruhr Metropolis „from above”. You thus get a visual impression of the different landmarks of the Ruhr Metropolis.