Old Elbe River Tunnel

The Alter Elbtunnel is a pedestrian and vehicular tunnel that runs underneath the Elbe River. It was built in 1911 as one of the first underwater tunnels in Europe. The tunnel allowed thousands of workers to easily travel from the main part of Hamburg across the river to the docks and shipyards. The tunnel is now open mostly to pedestrians. The tunnel begins with a 26 meter descent into the earth. For cars they have old wooden elevators that carry the cars down one by one, but I took the long flight of stairs. Once you are below the ground you travel 400 meters under the river through a tiled tunnel. On the other side, I went up almost an identical cavern and emerged into an industrial shipyard. It was interesting to see the city from another perspective. I also through in a picture of one of the many shipping canals that is full massive chunks of ice that ripple with passing of the barges and cargo ships.

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Elbe River Property

One of the projects that we have been working on at Breimann & Bruun is a private garden for a riverfront property on the Elbe river in Hamburg, Germany. The Elbe river was created by a glacier and at one point measured 2 km across, the back of this property is a part of this ancient riverbed and slopes drastically towards the current river. The site elevation changes a total of 25 meters from the house location to the end of the property. Along with two other interns, Marcel and Matthias, we constructed a 1:100 scale (1cm = 1m) model in order for the client to more fully understand the design intentions. B+B place a lot of value in high quality models when it comes to selling a design to a client.

After figuring the contours of the slope, the model was build up using styrofoam stilts and chipboard (two pieces were used for each piece to account for the vertical scale of the model).

B+B uses a vary defined palette of materials to create various different types of vegetation.

Just as the clients were showing up we were putting the finishing touches on our masterpiece an carrying it to the conference room, which is set daily with the finest coffee, tea, biscuits and goods that the port of Hamburg has to offer.

exploring the Hafencity

Last Saturday I ventured out into the freezing winds along the Elbe River to the Hafencity, a massive construction site along Hamburg's shoreline. This area will increase the city of Hamburg's urban area by 40%. The city built a new and expensive (and controversial) new transit line for easy public access to what will soon be a center for activity in the city.

My first trip to this place was very cold, as the wind from the river was blowing right at me. But I managed to take a few pictures while I was out.

The first is looking down into the canals of the older part of the waterfront district. This is just one of many canals that is covered with ice right now. Hamburg actually has more canals and waterways than any European city (yes including Amsterdam and Venice, etc...), mostly because of it size.

This next picture is looking out into the Elbe river. On the left is the construction of a new PhilHarmonic Symphony Hall for the people and city of Hamburg which is rumored to be one of the best in the world called Elphilharmonie Hamburg by Hohler + Partner Arckitekten. The project will not only contain a symphony hall but also residences and other amenities.

The last is on the bridge between the old part of the district and the new.You can see on the left the red brick architecture that is the standard of the older area, while on the right is the new development which is drastically different.

ein cafe!

On a cold walk around the Alster (lake in the center of Hamburg) John and I ran into this little place, come to find Doc has been running a cafe on the side all along.....curious...

room with a view

John and I finally made it Germany. We arrived to a heavy layer of snow, which is actually fairly rare for Hamburg as it rains mostly because it is situated off the coast of the North Sea and the Elbe River. Moved in to a little student apartment near the center of Hamburg. The view from our room is interesting, in the distance you can see the cranes of the Hafencity, which is currently the largest construction project in Europe.