Abstract:

Location: the old harbour districts of the Freie Hansestadt Bremen, located in the northwest of Germany, approximately 60 kilometres from the North Sea.
Development and realisation: Überseestadt GmbH – an affiliated company of the Bremer Investitions-Gesellschaft (BIG), Bremen’s official and fully authorized urban association for city development and economical support. The aim of the Überseestadt GmbH is to develop the area a new, then structure and market the sections.
Invest volume as planned: ca. 300 million Euros of public funds and anticipated 2 billion Euros of private investors.
Timeframe of realisation: 2000 until 2020

1. Basic information

The conception "Überseestadt" is an urbanistic project of the Freie Hansestadt Bremen with the aim to restructure the old harbour regions right of the River Weser. The challenge is to develop new perspectives for a 300 ha wide area, that underwent massive changes in the course of structural changes in the economy of maritime traffic and now is open for plentiful new ways of usage.

In close collaboration with private investors the genesis of the "Überseestadt" (Overseas Town) is targeted - a new city district that secures the present company constancy and conserves historical architecture, but at the same time develops plentiful new options of usage.

The vision is to add innovative offers in the realm of service supply, culture and leisure to the traditional coinage of nourishment economy, trade and logistics. Furthermore, the conception targets high-quality housing areas and generous free spaces to support Bremen’s general trend of revitalizing the river’s shores and "bringing them back" into the city’s identity and self-image.

2. Project description

The city of Bremen is coined through its River Weser. Harbour and trade have been identifying the appearance and selfconception of the North German metropolis since its foundation. The old harbour districts were of an accordant meaning: Significant parts of the city’s added value were obtained through expansive handling of goods, storing, production and packaging in the widespread areas in the west of the city. The structural changes in the maritime sea traffic economy as a consequence of ongoing containerisation left its mark on the old harbour districts.

After the handling of sea goods went down on 50% of its original quantity, new options for the usage of the districts became a possible perspective. The old harbour districts are the targets of a fundamental restructuring programme of the City of Bremen.

Throughout the following twenty years, a new city district will emerge from the 300-ha-area that keeps the historic maritime architecture and the companies on location, but at the same time offers a home to new companies and institutions in the wide range of service supply, office work and culture.

Furthermore, the emerging "Überseestadt" will be upvalued by generous green spaces, the high-quality development of the waterfront and exclusive housing areas.

At the present stage, about 300 companies with about 6 300 employees, mainly in the range of logistics, trade and production are located in the old harbour districts. The restructuring process is to integrate those existing companies and through that keep the historical identity of the area. Within this context, the central centre for food goods has taken up work in new premises –together with other companies within the range of nourishment and luxury foodstuffs, the centre forms the "Frischezentrum Nord" (freshness-centre north) on 16,3 ha and through that gave new impulses for the area’s economical development.

As it was in the past, the "Überseestadt" will be continuously interesting from a logistical perspective: The central location in Bremen, the direct link to the region’s important motorways A 1 and A 27, the nearness of airport and main station and – of course – the direct access to a 70 kilometres long waterway to the North Sea that’s suitable for ocean-going vessels, all that defines the site’s extraordinaire potentials.

Parallel to securing and developing the companies on location, the concept for the "Überseestadt" is aiming at a long-term process of upgrading the area through the settlement of new usages. All together, the concept is targeting the creation of 10 000 new jobs that would result in about 16 000 working places altogether in the "Überseestadt" in 2020. This considerable number of jobs will be spread on a wide range of companies of very diverse kinds: In the interaction of service supply (for instance in the range of renewable energies), office work, culture, leisure and a precisely developed gastronomical offer, a district will emerge that integrates at the same time the past, present and future identity of Bremen.

Apart from the central centre for food goods, the "Speicher XI" is the second big project within the restructuring process. After a sumptuous restoration, the historically extremely valuable, almost 400 metres long, monumentally protected harbour storage building – the only one of its kind on location without war damages - will host the Bremer "Hochschule für Künste" (Bremen High School of Arts) and several other cultural institutions from mid 2003 on. Furthermore, a number of service suppliers will move into the "Speicher".

The integration of the fine arts – at first through the High School of Arts, later through museums and cultural institutions – will have a big share in the revitalisation of the "Überseestadt" and will contribute to making the area more attractive. The special attraction of the long waterfronts, the urbanistic charm of the historical architecture and the still-vibrant harbour flair, all that provides an adequate framework for culture and leisure and underlines the identity of the "Überseestadt" as a district closely integrated into the city’s appearance and well accepted by Bremen’s inhabitants.

Such integration will be fundamentally dependent on the high-quality design of the district’s public spaces. The newly structured waterfront with its high-profile location at the river will provide the "Überseestadt" with an outstandingly attractive silhouette as much as an area of leisure and relaxation only two kilometres way from the city’s centre; the outer rims of the "Überseestadt", bordering at the neighbourhood districts Walle and Gröpelingen, will be enhanced by attractive architecture and high-quality design; the direct traffic linkage into the centre of town will take place through new streets and logistic restructuring; and with tree rows, generous green spaces and a high-quality design of streets and walkways, the  new infrastructure inside the "Überseestadt" will stress the appearance and self-image of the district and offer a generous rhythm of free spaces and buildings.

3. Aims and challenges

The whole concept of the "Überseestadt" is embedded in a general urbanistic restructuring process that takes place in Bremen.

Accordant to the city’s "rediscovering of the river", the shores and harbours along the Weser become important objects of Bremen’s urban development. The restructuring that has already taken place – for instance the development of the historical shoreline "Schlachte" into a high-class culinary-maritime area in the centre of town – finds its adequate pendants in the concrete plans for the "Überseestadt". Furthermore, the site’s potentials will give new impulses to the overall economical growth of Bremen.

Among others, the challenge will be to open up the harbour as a former "special area" and integrate it closely into the city through crucial restructuring of the areas infrastructure. Furthermore, it will be an important aim to establish the "Überseestadt" in the perception of Bremen’s inhabitants and guests through high-quality offers in the range of culture, leisure and relaxation, especially at the waterfront.

Possible tensions will probably emerge from the very diverse usage planned for the area.
Furthermore, the settlement and resettlement of emission-intensive usages typical of harbour regions must be planned carefully – especially along the borderline of the area, sufficient distances and thoughtful alignment of buildings and facilities must minimize any strain to a tolerable limit.

On all steps of the project’s realisation, the aim will be to combine, on the one hand, harbour-typical economy and other commercial usages with, on the other hand, a high urbanistic quality of life and develop a city district that mirrors Bremen’s identity in a balanced, highly attractive way.

The upgrading of the area means an advantage to both aims of development – high-quality public space and a well-developed location will attract high-quality usages, while the historic-maritime flair will bring a great number of visitors into the "Überseestadt".

4. Concept of realisation

The realisation of the concept to restructure the old harbour areas will take place in four steps:

Between 2000 and 2003, the aforementioned settlement of the "Frischezentrum Nord" took place. 16.3 ha of the former Überseehafen have been redeveloped to its new usage. Also within this timeframe, the new streets "Hansator" und "Konsul-Smidt-Straße" have been built that restructure the inner logistics of the "Überseestadt" and open the area to the neighbourhood districts.

Furthermore, the "Speicher XI", a storage building under monumental protection, has been sold and restored. In the future, the "Speicher" will host the Bremen High School of Arts, a number of service suppliers and a cultural forum.

Furthermore, this first phase was used to clear the area from old railway tracks and embankments, take down now useless customs fences and prepare premises for redevelopment.

Between 2003 and 2006, redeveloped real estates left and right of the new streets "Hansator" and "Konsul-Smidt-Straße" will be offered to investors and companies interested to engage themselves in the "Überseestadt". In this context, more clearing and preparing work is to be done. Furthermore with in this timeframe, the direct linkage into the city will be finished.

In a master plan, all ideas for the overall concept will be concretised, taking into consideration all aspects of urbanistic development, free-space-planning and infrastructure. The master plan will determine the usage for a number of spaces.

The sale of the old "Hafenhochhaus" ("harbour-skyscraper") to a bidding consortium that emerged from an international investor procedure will be concretised. The plan for this building targets to keep the old architecture and combine it with a visionary new building. More so, the project "Hafenkante" (harbour front) is to be realized. A 10-ha-sized part of the "Überseepark" (Overseas Park) is handed over to a group of investors with the obligation to develop an area of service supply, industry, culture and leisure.

Another central aim for this phase will be to market the real estates in direct neighbourhood of the "Frischezentrum Nord" to focus this part of the "Überseestadt" on nourishment-economy and luxury foodstuffs.

Between 2007 and 2010 the complete realisation of the infrastructure of the "Überseestadt" is targeted. Furthermore, plentiful structuring engineering measures with the purpose of upgrading the area will be taken. The settlement of the service suppliers along the waterfront takes place on the basis of the newly developed infrastructure of the "Überseestadt". Furthermore, the completion of the development of the public areas of the waterfront for public usage will take place.

From 2011 the clearing of other parts of the old harbour area of residual waste is targeted to use the potentials of these subunits along the waterfront within the framework of the overall restructuring concept applied on the "Überseestadt".