Nazi-era Berlin bunker transformed to luxury penthouse

Hindustan Times ^ | December 1, 2005

[1rudeboy]

Bingo. LOL

[The Red Zone]

It's still a plug ugly building. What are the windows going to look like in those 3 foot thick walls? Should've been demolished and a new building erected on the site.

[Robert A Cook PE]

Technically, its NOT a "bunker" but a Massive "Flak Tower."

[Jim Noble]

There are bunkers, and then there's THE bunker.

I was in Berlin right after reunification. They were still pulling down the wall, and no-man's land was untouched.

I went out on a hot summer day, and walked all over the dividing line between East and West Berlin.

I found the mound over THAT bunker, which still had a bent metal vent pipe sticling up above the ground.

I climbed the little hill.

It was remarkably cold up at the top.

[Robert A Cook PE]

Can't demolish it. Too expensive, too hard to blow up.

Story is wrong about "walls" being 3 foot thick.

Much of the interior (the four floors between ground and upper ammo handling and gun rooms) IS "walls" connecting and intersecting between elevator shafts, machinery rooms, and civilian omb shelter areas. 10-15 foot solid concrete is common.

[Junior]

It's not a bunker. It's a Flak Tower.

[BunnySlippers]

I don't agree. And I don't think you do either. You said you want "to puke". That tells me you're disgusted ... but you're not a historic preservationist.

There may be Germans who want to make monuments for various reasons out of their Nazi past but why? Better to let them be made into bastions of capitalism!

[BunnySlippers]

Oops, sent to the wrong person ... but same sentiment.

[viiince]

People, get a grip.

There's an estimated 7.000 bunkers still left of the 10.000 or so that were built 1941-45 in what's today Germany and Austria as part of what some say was the largest construction program since the Chinese Wall.

Many are invisible, but others, without doubt, are to be around for a veeery long time - as one of the main characteristics of ferro concrete is that the material reaches max strength after 40-50 years.

Naturally, many air-raid bunkers are in the middle of residential areas, and integrating them into daily life or infrastructure seems a good idea: there's museums in some of them, as well as apartments, shops and businesses, data storage, night clubs, water towers, military installations etc.

[primeval patriot]

There are quite a few Nazi era buildings still in use.

Goring's Air Ministry, Goebbel's Propaganda Ministry, Wermacht Headquarters.

Click here for buildings in Berlin.

Main website.

[frankiep]

I don't see anything really wrong with it at all. Use it for something useful.

I was took a day trip to Berlin back in August and was on a tour that took us to the site where Hitler's body was found. It is a children's park now. The reason for this is that they did not want to leave the place intact the way it was because of a fear of neo-Nazis treating it as some sort of sick shrine. I happen to agree with that reasoning.

[babyface00]

Jim,

I was in Hamburg right after the borders opened on business - my first and last trip to Germany. Everyone had the day off, so we crossed into the former East Germany and visited a few towns (Lubeck, Schwerin, and some other - it was years ago, I'd have to look at a map to recall exactly where we went).

It was an eerie scene. I still remember how the whole area smelled like an industrial complex because they were still burning coal. Also, I remember that every church that was still standing had holes in the roof and/or piles of rubble. In many ways, it was like WWII had ended yesterday. The East German troops will still there and still armed with automatic weapons. That was an interesting sight.

There was at least one bunker still standing in Hamburg as I recall. My hosts explained that, because the construction was so strong, it was not economically feasible to tear it down. Several attempts had been made at dynamiting it, to no effect - it was designed to resist blasting. It was definitely a grim reminder of the past, like the bombed-out churches that are scattered throughout Germany as constant reminders.

The bunker sat unused when I was there. Not sure what happened with it and I've since left that company and no longer travel internationally.

- Chris

[Nebr FAL owner]

It's a pile of concrete & rebar that was built as a bomb shelter . Giving it a sinister reputation simply because it was built in the early 40's is silly. Why it wasn't destroyed after the war is anybodies guess . The German govt. may have had plans to use it as a records storage vault, then later sold as surplus govt. property .

As for the failure to tear it down after it was sold, the cost of tearing down something built to withstand direct hits from 1000lbs. high explosive care packages from the RAF & the U.S. 8th Air Force would be extremely prohibitive.