| Eisenhüttenstadt | |
| Town hall | |
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Eisenhüttenstadt
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Location of the town of Eisenhüttenstadt within Oder-Spree district
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| Coordinates | |
| Administration | |
| Country | Germany |
| State | Brandenburg |
| District | Oder-Spree |
| Town subdivisions | 4 districts |
| Mayor | Dagmar Püschel (The Left) |
| Basic statistics | |
| Area | 63.40 km2 (24.48 sq mi) |
| Elevation | 42 m (138 ft) |
| Population | 31,132 (31 December 2010)[1] |
| - Density | 491 /km2 (1,272 /sq mi) |
| Other information | |
| Time zone | CET/CEST (UTC+1/+2) |
| Licence plate | LOS |
| Postal code | 15890 |
| Area code | 03364 |
| Website | www.eisenhuettenstadt.de |
Eisenhüttenstadt (literally "city of ironworks" in German; [ʔaɪznˈhʏtnʃtat] ( listen)) is a town in the Oder-Spree district of Brandenburg, Germany at the border with Poland. The town was founded in 1950 (under the name Stalinstadt) alongside a new steel mill as a socialist model city and has a population of 32,214 (as of 31 December 2008). It was formerly linked to Kloppitz by bridge.
Eisenhüttenstadt is colloquially referred to as Hütte or Hüttenstadt by locals.
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Eisenhüttenstadt is located on the Oder river in the Berlin-Warsaw glacial valley and is surrounded by terminal moraine hills to the south and pine forests. The Oder-Spree canal flows into the Oder in the town. Eisenhüttenstadt is located 25 km south of Frankfurt (Oder), 25 km north of Guben and 110 km east of Berlin.
After the foundation of Eisenhüttenstadt in 1950, the population rose from 2,400 in 1953 to 38,138 in 1965 to the historical high of 53,048 in 1988. Since German reunification in 1990, the population of Eisenhüttenstadt has continuously fallen (32,214 in 2008).
Fürstenberg was founded around 1250 by the Wettin Margrave Henry the Illustrious. Henry had acquired the former Lubusz Lands north of Szydłów (Schiedlo) from the Silesian duke Bolesław II the Bald of Legnica and incorporated the territory into his March of Lusatia. From 1316 to 1817 the town was enfeoffed to Neuzelle Abbey, located at the northern border of Lower Lusatia with the adjacent territory of the Margraves of Brandenburg.
After Emperor Charles IV of Luxembourg had incorporated Lower Lusatia into the Lands of the Bohemian Crown in 1367, he initiated the construction of the city wall. According to the 1635 Peace of Prague, Fürstenberg became part of the Electorate of Saxony and after the Congress of Vienna in 1815 passed to the Prussian Province of Brandenburg. In 1830, the population was 1,686. With the construction of the railway line from Frankfurt (Oder) to Breslau in 1846 and the construction of the Oder-Spree Canal in 1891, the development of Fürstenberg gained momentum. Between 1871 and 1900, the population doubled to 5,700 and reached 7,054 in 1933. In 1925, a river port at was constructed.
In the Nazi era, armament works and chemical plants were built in Fürstenberg. The workforce was recruited from a nearby subcamp of the Sachsenhausen and later from the Stalag III B prisoner-of-war camp. On 24 April 1945 Fürstenberg was captured by the Red Army. Retreating Wehrmacht troops had blasted the Oder bridge to Kloppitz, which has never been rebuilt. After the implementation of the 1945 Potsdam Agreement, Fürstenberg was an East German border town at the Oder-Neisse line.
The third congress of the Socialist Unity Party of Germany (20–24 July 1950) decided to erect a steel mill, the Eisenhüttenkombinat Ost, and an adjacent residential area. Construction began on 8 August 1950. The first blast furnace was put into operation one year later. The residential area was given the name Stalinstadt in honor of Joseph Stalin on 7 May 1953.
Eisenhüttenstadt was advertised as the "first socialist city on German soil". Like other new socialist towns, such as Nowa Huta in Poland, it followed the example of Magnitogorsk in the Soviet Union and was built alongside a new state combine. In the first years, the architecture was strongly influenced by Stalinist and neoclassical architecture. Later, as in all other East German towns and cities, Plattenbau architecture became predominant. The city plan was designed by the architect and planner Kurt Walter Leucht.
As a consequence of De-Stalinization, the town name was changed to Eisenhüttenstadt (German for "Ironwork City") on 13 November 1961. On the same day, the neighboring settlement of Fürstenberg was merged into the town. On 1 January 1969, the Eisenhüttenkombinat Ost together with other steel manufacturing enterprises was consolidated into the state-run VEB Bandstahlkombinat "Hermann Matern".
After German reunification, the VEB Bandstahlkombinat "Hermann Matern" was renamed into EKO Stahl AG and prepared for privatization by the Treuhandanstalt. Due to increased competition from West German steel makers and the collapse of markets in Eastern Europe the EKO Stahl AG had to lay off workers and close several blast furnaces. In 1995, the steel mill was privatized and sold to the Belgian steel maker Cockerill-Sambre, now part of ArcelorMittal.
The first design for the new residential quarter was developed by the modernist and Bauhaus architect, Franz Ehrlich, in August 1950. His modernist plan, which laid out a dispersed town landscape along functional lines, was rejected by the Ministry for Reconstruction. The same happened to the plan presented by the architects Kurt Junghanns and Otto Geiler. The plan that was ultimately realized was developed by Kurt Walter Leucht.[2][3]
Eisenhüttenstadt's economy is dominated by the steel maker ArcelorMittal Eisenhüttenstadt (former called EKO Stahl GmbH), a subsidiary of Arcelor Mittal. The unemployment rate has steadily risen since German reunification and was at 11.5 percent in 2008.
Eisenhüttenstadt is connected by two federal highways, Bundesstraße 112 and 246, to Frankfurt (Oder), Guben and Storkow (Mark). The next motorway is in Frankfurt (Oder). The town has a railroad station with hourly trains to Berlin, Frankfurt (Oder) and Cottbus. The town is also linked to Berlin by the Oder-Spree Canal.
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