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Großbelastungskörper
Luckily Hitler didn't win World War II, as
Berlin would be called "Germania" now and look like the pic on the left.
The plan was to tear down whole districts and construct something
architecturally very impressive. At least the tearing down of whole
districts went well, although Adolf got a little help by Russia, England
and the USA.
The masterpiece should have been a
triumphal arch, 170 meters wide and 140 meters high. But Hitler's
architect Albert Speer was wondering if the Berlin ground was able
to bear the gigantic weight of the arch.
So he built the "Großbelastungskörper"
- which means "building for testing extreme loads".
Mainly french prisoners of war had
to assemble 12 360 tons of concrete and steel to build this ugly
thing. It's 14 meters high, has 21 meters in diameter and goes 18
meters deep in the ground.
Since 1941 the "mushroom", how the
building is called by the Berliners, is sinking deeper and deeper
into the ground. It made 19 centimeters in 60 years.
Since 1995 the building is
protected by Germany's laws for preservation of ancient
monuments, so they can't just pull it down.
As nobody knows what do with it,
the thing is just standing around in the district of
Tempelhof.
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