View from the Monbijou Bridge to the Berlin TV Tower

by Silva Wischeropp

This photo was taken looking from the Monbijou Bridge to the Berlin TV Tower at the Bode Museum, directly on Berlin's Museum Island (Unesco World Heritage Site).
The listed Monbijou Bridge crosses the Spree and the Kupfergraben, part of the Spree Canal, in Berlin's Mitte district. Today's bridge was built at the beginning of the 20th century over both arms of the Spree and rests on the top of Museum Island. The northern part of the double bridge was reconstructed in 2006 after years of provisional construction.
The opening of the Berlin Wall and the subsequent merging of the two halves of the city made it possible to restore the entire Monbijou Bridge using numerous original materials. On 12 October 2006, the then Senator for Urban Development, Ingeborg Junge-Reyer, the General Director of the National Museums in Berlin, Peter-Klaus Schuster, and the Vice-President of the Water and Shipping Directorate East, Heinz Weiß, opened the renovated Monbijou Bridge.
An unadorned steel load-bearing segment, each weighing 100 tonnes and made in two longitudinal sections to match the original appearance, spans the right arm of the Spree. These bridge sections were placed on the renewed old abutments with a ship's crane and then clad in sandstone.
The design of the new half of the bridge does not correspond to the original plans, but its elegant, lightweight construction meets the requirements of historians, bridge engineers and architects, as well as those of Spree shipping, because it does not require a central bridge pier.