Freiburg im Breisgau (in the local dialect: Friabrug) is a large
city on the edge of the Black Forest and is located in the southwest
of the federal state of Baden-Württemberg. Even if Freiburg has more
than 200,000 inhabitants, in many places it is more rural and rural.
In 1091 the Zähringer family built a castle on the Schlossberg.
City rights were granted to two settlements in today's urban area in
1120 by Konrad and Duke Bertold III. Rich silver deposits in the
Black Forest and the favorable location brought rapid growth and
prosperity to Freiburg. In the year 1200, Bertold V. began building
the cathedral. Later, the citizens of the city took over the
property development. The Freiburg Minster, initially begun in the
Romanesque style, is one of the best-known Gothic buildings,
particularly because of its openwork spire. It was completed in
1513. In 1218 the Zähringer family died out with Bertold V. and the
Counts of Urach (later Counts of Freiburg) took over the rule. 1368
the citizens of the city of Egino III. The Counts of Freiburg
ransomed them for 20,000 silver marks and put themselves and the
city under the Habsburg dynasty. After a short recession, Freiburg
was an imperial city between 1415 and 1427. With the renewed
takeover by the Habsburgs, Duke Albrecht founded the university in
1457.
During the Thirty Years' War, Freiburg was repeatedly
fought over and besieged, the population fell sharply and almost all
of the suburbs were destroyed. After French troops took Freiburg in
1677, the city belonged to the French crown until 1697. During his
reign, King Louis XIV ordered his fortress builder Vauban to
demolish the old city walls and build a fortress with eight bastions
around the old town. The old Zähringer Castle was replaced by three
forts. In the period that followed, Freiburg alternated between
Austria and France between 1697 and 1745. When the French withdrew,
they again razed all the fortifications.
In 1805 Napoleon
incorporated Freiburg into the Grand Duchy of Baden. In the years
that followed, Freiburg developed into an important political and
economic center. In 1821/1827 Freiburg became the seat of the
archbishop and in 1845 the first railway ran from Freiburg to
Offenburg. The second half of the 19th century continued to be
marked by growth. New districts (Wiehre, Stühlinger) were created
and more were incorporated (Günterstal and Haslach). In 1899, for
the first time in Germany, a woman was enrolled at the University of
Freiburg.
The beginning of the 20th century was also
characterized by growth. In 1910 the municipal theater was
inaugurated and a year later the new university building. During the
Nazi dictatorship, the Freiburg synagogue was also set on fire and
destroyed as part of the Reichspogromnacht in 1938. The 2nd World
War, started by Germany in 1939, hit the city again and again. The
largest air raid on November 27, 1944 destroyed large parts of the
city within a few hours. In the city center, which was almost
completely destroyed, only the Freiburg Minster was left, which was
hardly damaged. From April 1945, Freiburg was occupied by units of
the French army, which set up an administration for the state of
Baden in Freiburg a year later. After the merger of the states of
Baden and Württemberg into one federal state, Freiburg became the
seat of the regional council.
By plane
The nearest airport is EuroAirport
Basel-Mulhouse-Freiburg (IATA: BSL, MLH, EAP) , which is between Basel
and Mulhouse. The airport can be reached by train (via Basel) or via the
autobahn (A5 to the Neuenburg autobahn triangle and then via
Ottmarsheim/Mulhouse on the A35) or shuttle bus.
Frankfurt
Airport (IATA: FRA) with good train connections to the ICE long-distance
train station and Zurich Airport (IATA: ZRH) can also be reached by
train within two hours and offer many connections.
By train
Freiburg's main train station in the city center offers connections to
the north (Baden-Baden, Karlsruhe, Mannheim), east (Donaueschingen,
Villingen-Schwenningen, Ulm), south (Weil am Rhein, Basel) and to the
west there is a connection to Paris via Strasbourg by TGV. The smaller
communities in the vicinity can be reached by Breisgau S-Bahn. ICE
trains (Berlin, Hamburg, Ruhr area, Zurich) also run on the north-south
route. There are also night trains to Berlin, Hamburg.
In the
street
In Freiburg im Breisgau, environmental zones have been set up
in accordance with the Fine Dust Ordinance. If you don't have the
appropriate badge, you risk a fine of €100 when entering an
environmental zone. This also applies to foreign road users.
Freiburg is on the A 5 autobahn, which runs through the Rheingraben from
Basel in the south to Baden-Baden and Karlsruhe in the north. The B 31
leads through the Black Forest, some of which (particularly in
Höllental) has been expanded to four lanes.
By bus
Freiburg -
Friedrichshafen - Munich, since April 2012 the first domestic German
line in long-distance traffic. Since 2013 there have been numerous
connections, e.g. to Stuttgart, Düsseldorf, Frankfurt am Main, Berlin,
Prague and the Balkans. There are also new international bus connections
to Zurich or Milan. The Freiburg long-distance bus stop is at the ZOB in
front of the station.
By bicycle
Baden Wine Cycle Path
(eastern route) − from Grenzach on the High Rhine via Basel to
Laudenbach on the border with Hesse
Southern Black Forest Cycle Path
− 270km circular route from Hinterzarten via Titisee, to the High Rhine
near Waldshut, Basel, Freiburg to Kirchzarten. · Southern Black Forest
Nature Park
Green Road Bike Tour − From Lake Titisee in the southern
Black Forest via Freiburg and Breisach, and via Munster and Épinal in
the Southern Vosges to Contrexéville in Lorraine. (also by car)
Five tram and 26 bus lines open up the entire city area. Four of the
five tram lines cross at Bertoldsbrunnen. An online timetable and route
map can be found on the VAG Freiburg website.
However, due to the
compact location, no public transport is required to explore the city
centre. Freiburg's city center is very easy to explore on foot; the rest
of the city is easy to cycle to, with which almost 30% of the distances
are covered − bicycle information for the city of Freiburg. Two
short-term bike rental systems can be used in Freiburg.
calla
bike | A station at the main train station.
Frelo (Nextbike) | 55
stations throughout the city.
There are also other ways to rent
bikes, e.g. in the Mobile (bicycle parking garage) behind the main train
station.
The Regio-Verkehrsverbund-Freiburg, which combines more
than 90 lines and is provided with a common fare system, extends around
Freiburg. Timetables and tariffs can be found on the
Regio-Verkehrsverbund website. Another way to explore the surrounding
area is the Breisgau S-Bahn.
In Freiburg there are remarkable buildings from all eras of the
city's history. A large part of the historic old town was destroyed in
the bombing raid on November 27, 1944. Surprisingly, the cathedral, the
south-east corner of the cathedral square with the historic department
store, Wentzingerhaus and Alter Wache, as well as the two remaining
medieval city gates, remained almost intact. After the war, the old town
was largely rebuilt in the historical proportions with the size of the
property and the height of the eaves.
Freiburg has had a design
advisory board since 2014. In these, five experts from the fields of
architecture, urban planning and landscape architecture were elected for
three years. They should advise the city on important construction
projects that shape the cityscape and contribute technical arguments.
During their term of office, members may not plan or build in Freiburg.
Notable buildings include:
The Freiburg Minster is the symbol
of the city and its most important building. It was built as a parish
church and therefore has only one main tower. The numerous works of art
include the high altar and the Schnewlin altar by Hans Baldung Grien,
the so-called Oberriedaltar by Hans Holbein the Elder. J. and some very
beautiful medieval stained glass windows, some of which were donated by
the craftsmen's guilds. The 116 meter high Gothic tower of the Minster
towers over all the buildings in the city. In 1869, the art historian
Jacob Burckhardt honored it with the following words in a series of
lectures in comparison with Basel and Strasbourg: "And Freiburg will
probably remain the most beautiful tower on earth". This led to the
well-frequently heard, but not written, quote of the “most beautiful
tower in Christianity”. The market is held daily (except Sundays) around
the Freiburg Minster.
At Münsterplatz: The historic department
store from 1532 with magnificent sculptures of Habsburg rulers is
striking because of its oxblood red colour, the corner turrets covered
with colored tiles and its stepped gables. Johann Christian Wentzinger
built the house "Zum Schönen Eck" from 1761 (Wentzingerhaus) as his own
residential and studio building in the late Baroque style. Since 1994 it
has housed the Museum of City History. The Old Guard, built as the main
guard of the Austrian guard garrison in 1733, now serves as the "House
of Baden Wines" after a wide variety of uses.
The Alte
Münsterbauhütte is the oldest surviving building in the old town with
visible half-timbering. It was built as a building for the
"Münsterfabrik", which had been responsible for building the Freiburg
parish church since the 13th century. The half-timbered floor was later
added to the building, which then offered an apartment for the tower
guard. Today, the Münsterbauverein runs a small shop here, and the
Münster parish has a meeting and counseling center. The Archbishop's
Ordinariate, the administrative building of the Catholic Archdiocese of
Freiburg, is within sight. The building, erected between 1903 and 1906
in a historicizing style, has a natural stone facade richly ornamented
in the late Romanesque style. In addition to Byzantine style elements,
the interior also points to Art Nouveau. Opposite is the "Collegium
Borromaeum" planned by Christoph Arnold, a student of Friedrich
Weinbrenner, with the Konviktskirche from the years 1823 to 1826, which
today is a seminary for the Archdiocese of Freiburg. Not far away is the
archbishop's archive, built in 2002, a cubic building clad in sandstone.
Two churches in the historic old town deserve attention. The
interior of the Gothic Church of St. Martin (Franciscan Church) on the
Rathausplatz is deliberately plain and originally, as a mendicant
church, had no tower. A bell tower with a pointed spire was only built
between 1890 and 1893. After the destruction in World War II, the tower
was given a pyramidal roof. The baroque university church
(Jesuitenkirche) next to the old university was almost completely
destroyed in the Second World War and was not painted again after the
reconstruction. An outstanding and striking work of art in the choir
room since 1988 is a 16 meter high sculpture of the suffering Christ,
created and made available as a loan by the Münstertal artist Franz
Gutmann.
Instead of the Old Ludwig Church, which was destroyed in
1944, on the northern edge of the city center, a modern church building
with pioneering architecture was built between 1952 and 1954 in the
Herdern district according to plans by Horst Linde. Another notable
contemporary church building is the Maria Magdalena Church by Cologne
architect Susanne Gross in the Rieselfeld district. This church is
available to the evangelical and catholic communities with one room each
and was inaugurated in 2004.
The Augustinian Museum is housed in
the former monastery of the Augustinian hermits, the oldest parts of
which date back to the 14th century.
The two gate towers, which
are still preserved from the medieval city fortifications, characterize
the image of the city centre. The older Martinstor was increased almost
threefold to 60 meters in 1901 and received a roof structure in the
style of the 15th century. The Schwabentor was also increased in 1901 to
almost twice the height and provided with openwork stepped gables in the
style of North German city towers. These were dismantled again in 1954
and the gate tower was given a pyramid roof along with a bell tower with
an onion dome.
In the upper old town, not far from the
Schwabentor, is the Hotel/Restaurant Zum rote Bären; it is considered
the oldest inn in Germany. The very deep foundations date from before
1120, when the city was founded.
Jakob Villinger von Schönenberg,
grand treasurer of Maximilian I – the king was sovereign of Freiburg
from 1490 to 1519 – built the “Haus zum Whale” which was completed in
1515. The humanist and philosopher Erasmus von Rotterdam lived there
after fleeing Protestant Basel from 1529 to 1531. After numerous
renovations in the 18th and 19th centuries, the city acquired the house
in 1905 and made it available to the Sparkasse Freiburg in 1909. The
Haus Zum Walfisch burned down in 1944 as a result of the British bombing
raid, but after its reconstruction it remained the headquarters of
today's Sparkasse Freiburg-Nördlicher Breisgau.
Not far from
there, on Kaiser-Joseph-Strasse, is one of the most important secular
buildings in Freiburg, the "Basler Hof". It was created at the end of
the 15th century when several older houses were converted by Konrad
Stürtzel, court chancellor of Emperor Maximilian I. From 1587 to 1677
the building served as an exile residence for the Basel cathedral
chapter, which was no longer able to stay in Basel due to the
Reformation. From 1698 to 1802 it was the official seat of the Austrian
government. It performs a similar function today: this is the
representative office of the District President. Most of the offices of
the Freiburg Regional Council are housed in a new building in the west
of the city.
There are also interesting buildings from different
eras between the western edge of the old town and the main train
station: The so-called Colombischlössle on Rotteckring, built in 1869-71
on the “St. Louis" of the former Vauban fortifications as a stately
villa in neo-Gothic style, lies in a small park in which vines can be
found for display purposes in the middle of the city. From 1947 to 1951
this was the seat of the (South) Baden state government. The city's
Archaeological Museum has been housed here since 1983. The City Theater
was built in 1905-1910 on the "Dauphin" bastion of the aforementioned
fortification with Art Nouveau elements. It was almost completely
destroyed in 1944 and rebuilt after World War II. On the site of the Old
Synagogue, it forms an impressive ensemble with the college buildings I
and II of the university. – Next to it is the Freiburg University
Library, which was built as a concrete building in 1978 on the site of a
high school building from the historicist era. After 30 years, it was
rebuilt according to the plans of the Basel office Degelo Architekten.
The Freiburg Concert Hall is located near the main train station. Its
realization was heavily disputed in the citizenry.
With 19 floors
and a height of 60 meters, the Freiburg train station tower on
Bismarckallee is the fourth tallest building in the city after the
Minster and the residential buildings at Krozinger Strasse No. 52 and
No. 78. It is part of the "Forum Hauptbahnhof Freiburg" building
complex, which was built in 1997. The station tower is also called
"Solar Tower" because a large part of the south facade consists of solar
cells. Offices are located in the high-rise office building, as well as
a club lounge (bar) on the top two floors. The building complex also
includes a second high-rise called the “Office Tower” and the Freiburg
Planetarium. The high-rise “Inter City Hotel” is also located at the
main train station. The three skyscrapers (Solar Tower, Office Tower and
Inter City Hotel) form a small skyline.
Münsterplatz is the largest paved square in Freiburg. The weekly
market takes place here every weekday morning, on the north side the
farmer's market and on the south side the dealer's market. In the Middle
Ages there was a cemetery around the minster. On the north side, the
outlines of the former ossuary chapel are marked in the pavement. On the
west side of the square there are two fountains, to the north a copy of
the Fischbrunnen, the model of which was created by Master Hans von
Basel in 1483 and formerly stood on Marktgass (today's
Kaiser-Joseph-Straße), and to the south the Georgsbrunnen from the
beginning of the 19th century 16th century with a gilded statue of St.
George. The three sandstone pillars in front of the main portal of the
minster go back to a donation from 1719 by the three combined estates of
the western part of Austria; they carry sculptures of the two “younger”
city patrons, Lambert von Maastricht and Alexander, flanking the Virgin
Mary as the patroness of the cathedral.
Augustinerplatz is one of
the central squares in Freiburg's old town. Surrounded by the former
Augustinian monastery - today's Augustinian museum - and the remains of
the former city wall, the square is a popular meeting place for the
people of Freiburg. The course of the old city wall can be seen from the
different paving. After the demolition of the formerly neighboring
Feierling brewery and the redesign of the square, a phenomenon developed
that is jokingly compared to the conditions at the Spanish Steps in
Rome. On the steps of Augustinerplatz and in the surrounding area, many
people enjoy urban life with a Mediterranean flair on summer nights.
However, since the high noise level sometimes disturbs the night's sleep
of the residents, an attempt was made to reduce the noise level in 2009
with the erection of the Tolerance Pillar, which switches from rainbow
colors to red light at 11 p.m. However, there was no success, and the
column, which cost 18,000 euros, caused ridicule. Since 2017, operations
have shifted somewhat to the newly designed square of the Old Synagogue.
The square of the Old Synagogue (former names: Theaterplatz,
Europaplatz) along the western side of the former city fortifications is
now bordered by the College Buildings I and II of the University, the
University Library and the Freiburg City Theater. The synagogue stood at
the southern end in front of Collegiate Buildings I and II until the
pogrom night in November 1938. The name of the square and a memorial
fountain are reminiscent of this, as is a signpost to Gurs, the place
where most of the Jews from Freiburg were deported in 1940. The square
was rebuilt in connection with a new traffic concept in 2016/17. A gap
between Collegiate Buildings I and II leads to the "Platz der Weißen
Rose" (White Rose Square), which is surrounded by university buildings
and commemorates student resistance during National Socialism.
The Europaplatz was also fundamentally redesigned from 2015 to 2018 and
only then received its current name. It is located at the northern end
of Kaiser-Joseph-Straße and thus at the end of the pedestrian zone and
connects the Altstadtring with Bundesstraße 3 at a T-junction. It is
characterized by the former Karlkaserne and the Victory Monument, which
gave the square its unofficial name for many years . The old official
name Kaiser-Wilhelm-Platz could not be accepted by the population.
The Rathausplatz used to be named after the former monastery
Franziskanerplatz, of which only the Gothic Martinskirche and a part of
the cloister have survived. The Old Town Hall and the New Town Hall
border the square on the other side. On the square stands a fountain
with a monument to the monk Berthold Schwarz from the former neighboring
monastery, who is said to have invented gunpowder (black powder).
Oberlinden and Unterlinden are tranquil squares in different
quarters of the old town, each with an old linden tree that gives it its
name. The "Upper Linde" has been standing since 1729, the fountain from
1861 is crowned by a baroque Madonna by Franz Hauser (1651-1717).
The potato market is a popular old town square. In the middle is a
fountain donated by the businessman Ludwig Rau in 1911, which was
designed by Carl Anton Meckel and Ludwig Kubanek. Adelhauser-Platz is
considered by many Freiburg residents to be the most beautiful square in
Freiburg, small and away from the large crowds of pedestrians. It bears
its name after the Adelhausen monastery that was based there, of which
the church is still preserved. After several conversions, two museums
and the administration of the foundation are housed in the monastery
buildings.
The Bertoldsbrunnen fountain is located at the central
intersection of Kaiser-Joseph-Straße and Bertold-/Salzstraße. Four of
the city's five tram lines meet here, even at the same times during
off-peak times to allow for transfers.
The Wiwilíbrücke connects the Stühlinger district of Freiburg with
the old town. The bridge is a listed building and is used by up to
10,000 cyclists per day.
The Karlssteg is a 136.5 meter long
pedestrian bridge in a tension band construction. A concrete strip just
25 cm thick with 60 sagging tendons inside leads from Karlsplatz to the
Stadtgarten, with the tendons sagging by up to 40 cm at high
temperatures.
The Kronenbrücke is one of the two oldest bridges in
Freiburg, but was rebuilt in 2018 because the old construction was not
suitable for the planned Stadtbahn route.
The Schlossberg on the edge of the old town is a nature reserve with
numerous walking paths, Nordic walking routes and two restaurants above
the roofs of the city, and at 80 hectares it is the city's largest park.
At the top is the Schlossberg Tower, which since 2002 has offered an
impressive all-round view of the entire city and its surroundings, the
Black Forest to the east and the Vosges Mountains to the west.
The
Arlesheimer See, a former quarry pond, is now a nature reserve in the
Mooswald on the western outskirts of the city.
The Schauinsland is
the city's "local mountain". Its summit (1284 m above sea level) is
still within the municipal boundaries. The Schauinslandbahn was opened
in 1930 and was the first cable car based on the circulation principle;
the observation tower bears the name of the former mayor Eugen Keidel.
The show mine gives an insight into ore mining, which was practiced here
from the Middle Ages until the middle of the 20th century.
The
Freiburger Bächle, small gullies along the roadside in most of the
alleys and streets of the old town, were first mentioned in 1220.
Many sidewalks (sidewalks) in the city center are paved with Rhine
pebble mosaics. In many places ornaments or i.e.. in front of shops,
symbolic representations incorporated. The coats of arms of all partner
cities are embedded in this way in front of the Old and New Town Hall.
The Freiburg sports club, which has been playing in the 1st
Bundesliga again since the 2016/17 season, is at home in the
Dreisamstadion.
The planetarium near the main train station shows
cosmic connections in changing programs.
As a small zoo, the animal
enclosure at Mundenhof is a popular destination for families with
children. The tent music festival (ZMF) with soloists from different
genres (from classical to pop) takes place every year in early summer on
the neighboring site of the Stadtgut.
The botanical garden is part of
the biological faculty at the university, a research and teaching garden
as well as a showplace for botany; it is open to the public.
The St.
Michael's Chapel with the Dance of Death from the eighteenth century is
located in the Old Cemetery in the Neuburg district.
In the main
cemetery, a collective grave and a commemorative plaque commemorate 50
victims of the "euthanasia" murders.
The Seepark with Seeparkturm is
the former site of the 1986 State Horticultural Show in the west of the
city.
The Jewish cemetery is also in one of the western parts of the
city (Mooswald). There is a memorial for the victims of the Shoah.
The Holbein horse, "Standing Foal", is a cast concrete sculpture by the
sculptor Werner Gürtner, which stands on a small patch of grass at the
"Holbeinstrasse" tram stop. Since 1980, unknown persons have been
secretly decorating it with new coats of paint, often quite
imaginatively, at irregular intervals.
The Jesuit Castle in nearby
Merzhausen is located on the slopes of the Schönberg and offers a good
view over Freiburg, the Vosges, the Kaiserstuhl, the Rhine plain and the
southern Black Forest.
The Victory Monument is a monument dedicated
to the XIV Army Corps, dedicated in 1876, to commemorate the German
victory in the Franco-Prussian War of 1870/71.
The Wasserschlössle in
the district of Wiehre is a water tower (moated castle) whose facade is
a stylized castle based on the Freiburg city seal.
The Lorettoberg
with the listed Loretto chapel and the Hilda tower is a popular
destination for excursions and walks.
The Kartause Freiburg is a
former baroque Carthusian monastery, which today houses an international
college. It is about 3 km east of the city center in the Dreisamtal.
The Theater Freiburg is a three-section theater with drama, musical
theater and ballet. Three stages are used: the big house, the theater
and the chamber stage. The “workroom” and the Winterer foyer are still
available for special occasions. The dance troupe pvc (physical virus
collective) appears as a cooperation project at the theaters in Freiburg
and Heidelberg. The Philharmonic Orchestra plays in the Konzerthaus.
Peter Carp has been director since the 2017/2018 season.
Like
most theaters run by cities, the Freiburger Haus is subject to great
austerity constraints due to the municipal financial crisis.
Nevertheless, after a survey of theater critics, the trade journal "Die
deutsche Bühne" was able to award the Freiburg Stadttheater first place
for "unusually convincing theater work away from large theater centers"
(autumn 2007).
There are also a number of smaller theatres:
The Wallgraben-Theater, once a student basement theater, is best known
for its Loriot performances with Heinz Meier†. Today it takes place in
the basement of the New Town Hall, in whose inner courtyard open-air
performances are also shown in summer.
The Theater im Marienbad is
the Freiburg children's and youth theater and plays in the former small
indoor swimming pool of an abandoned bath.
The Alemannische Bühne
Freiburg performs plays in the Alemannic dialect.
The “Front House
Freiburg – Culture in the Factory” is mainly a cabaret stage.
Cala
Theater (formerly Galli Theater) Fribourg
KIEV – Chamber plays in the
E-Werk Freiburg
Cargo Theater Freiburg
The Theater of the
Immoralists
The Theater Hans Dürr is an amateur theater and is known
for the Shakespeare Company and productions in the Black Monastery.
Harry's Depot is the smallest theater in town
SpielRaum Freiburg:
Stage of the Freiburg Institute for Theater Education and the
Studiobühne Freiburg
There is a lively improvisational theater scene
in Friborg with around 10 professional and amateur groups performing in
different venues.
Freiburg has several providers who offer scenic
(theater-like) city tours, often with professional actors
(Historix-Tours, Freiburg Kultour, Timewalking). Ghost walks are also
held in the evenings.
In mid-June, the festival season in Freiburg will open with the
Tuesday organ concerts in the Münster (until the end of September), at
which performers will present programs ranging from the early baroque to
the modern. Many cultural festivals take place in Freiburg over the
course of the year, for example the reportage festival MUNDOlogia in
February, an open-air theater sports festival, the International Dance
Festival,[81] in the summer since 1983 the International Tent Music
Festival (ZMF ), the Münster summer with concerts, theatre, readings and
exhibitions as well as many other events.
Since 2005, a colorful
series of events has been presented in the garden of Schloss Ebnet in
the district of the same name during the Ebnet Cultural Summer from the
end of May to July.
Every two years in May, the Freiburg film
forum, a renowned festival of ethnographic film, takes place. The Sea of
Love music festival has been held in Freiburg-Hochdorf am Tunisee every
July since 2002. In 2011, with around 25,000 visitors, Sea of Love was
the most visited music festival in Baden-Württemberg after the Southside
Festival in Neuhausen ob Eck.
Every year at the beginning of
August, the renowned Freiburg musician Murat Coşkun organizes the
world's most important frame drum festival Tamburi Mundi for percussion
enthusiasts in the E-Werk, with public concerts, workshops and sessions.
At the end of the season, the Freiburg Jazz Festival, jointly
organized by E-Werk and Jazzhaus, takes place in September, at which
international stars of the jazz scene can be heard.
With numerous orchestras and choirs, including some with an international reputation, Freiburg has a lively musical life. Above all, Freiburg is known as a choir city (Freiburger Domsingknaben, jazz choir). Important sources of inspiration are – in different styles – the Freiburg University of Music, which has existed since 1946, with students and master students from all over the world, as well as the Freiburg Jazz and Rock School. In addition, there is the experimental studio of the Heinrich Strobel Foundation in the broadcasting center of Südwestrundfunk, which has been one of the most important sources of inspiration for new music since it was founded in 1969.
The Freiburg Philharmonic Orchestra, conducted by General Music
Director Fabrice Bollon since 2008, is the theatre's house orchestra.
Freiburg Baroque Orchestra (FBO) under the alternating direction of
Gottfried von der Goltz and Petra Müllejans
The Balthasar Neumann
Ensemble is conducted by Thomas Hengelbrock.
Per Tutti Orchestra
(University of Fribourg)
Academic Orchestra Freiburg e. V., founded
in 1963
Young Chamber Philharmonic Freiburg e. V
KHG Orchestra e.
V
The Consortium Classicum was founded in 1966 by the clarinetist
Dieter Klöcker and is primarily dedicated to the music of the late 18th
and 19th centuries.
Holst-Sinfonietta (chamber ensemble) and youth
orchestra of the Holst-Sinfonietta (JOHS), Freiburg, conductor: Klaus
Simon
The ensemble aventure is a chamber ensemble dedicated mainly to
music of the 20th century and contemporary music.
The ensemble
recherche is one of the most renowned ensembles for the interpretation
of new music.
The Baden-Württemberg Ensemble Academy Freiburg e. V.
offers professional musicians and advanced students of instrumental
music and singing additional education and training opportunities. It is
performed by the Freiburg Baroque Orchestra and the ensemble recherche.
ORSO Choir and Orchestra Society, an association of various choirs and
orchestras
Freiburg Orchestra Society, founded in 1960 as an amateur
orchestra.
camerata academica freiburg e. V., founded in 1997
Rascher Saxophone Quartet
All Registers – The Gender Mix Choir
Anton Webern Choir Freiburg
Balthasar Neumann Choir and Ensemble, conducted by Thomas Hengelbrock
Bächlechor, conductor: Claudia Mundi
The Bush Orchestra, conductor:
Christian Deichert
Camerata Vocale Freiburg, founded in 1977;
Direction: Winfried Toll
Christ Choir
Contrappunto bestiale - The
Biochor
German-French Choir
Evangelical student choir in Freiburg
Freiburg Bach Choir
Freiburg Cathedral Choir and Freiburg Cathedral
Chapel (Chamber Choir)
Freiburg Cathedral Boys' Choir
Freiburg
Gospel Choir, direction: Carsten Schulz
Freiburg Chamber Choir,
conductor: Lukas Grimm
Freiburg Cantata Choir, conductor: Wolfgang
Failer
Freiburg Oratorio Choir
Freiburg vocal ensemble, conductor:
Wolfgang Schäfer
Heinrich Schütz Kantorei Freiburg, director: Bernd
Scharfenberger
Freiburg Jazz Choir
John Sheppard Ensemble,
conducted by Bernhard Schmidt
Junge Kantorei Freiburg, direction:
Christoph Andreas Schäfer
Madrigal Choir of the KHG
Girls Choir at
the Freiburg Minster
ORSO Choir and Orchestra Society, direction:
Wolfgang Roese
Choir of the Freiburg University of Education,
directed by Stefan Weible
University Romanesque Choir
Russian
University Choir (since 1930)
SUSI Choir, direction: Ansgar Rettner
Tune Up!, choir of the Jazz & Rock Schools Freiburg, conducted by Rolf
Schwoerer-Böhning
Unichor Freiburg, conductor: Lisa Hummel
Voice
Event – selection choir of the Freiburg schools
Central meeting places for the folk, jazz and rock scene are the
Restaurant Waldsee, the Wodan Hall in the Ganter beer garden and the
Jazzhaus, which is regularly filled with music by the international
elite. The Waldi Heidepriem Prize is regularly awarded by the city of
Freiburg. It is named after the modern jazz pianist Waldi Heidepriem,
who worked in Freiburg until his death in 1998 and was involved in
establishing the Jazzhaus Freiburg. Other well-known jazz artists from
Freiburg are Thomas Heidepriem, Dieter Ilg, as well as the Cécile Verny
Quartet and the Freiburg soul formation tok tok tok. In addition to the
Jazzhaus, the E-Werk, with its larger concerts in the areas of rock, pop
and world music (“creole in concert”), the Ruefetto and the Waldsee with
its “Jazz without Stress” series of events are popular meeting places
for the Freiburg jazz community. Scene. Arranged by the local concert
organizer KOKO & DTK Entertainment, well-known rock and pop greats can
be found regularly in the concert hall and in the SICK Arena, the
multifunctional event hall of the Freiburg Exhibition Center. If you
like listening to country, rockabilly or 60s modbeats, you've come to
the right place at Great Räng Teng Teng. Those who prefer to listen to
alternative or punk go to the traditional Café Atlantic at the
Schwabentor.
In addition, there is a large number of music clubs,
brass bands, amateur choirs and bands of various styles, which are of
more local importance.
Based on the number of inhabitants, according to information from
2008, Freiburg had the most cinema-goers in Germany. On average, every
Freiburg resident goes to a cinema almost six times a year to see a
film. The national average was 1.66.
In the CinemaxX of a
nationwide cinema operator as a multiplex cinema, mainly Hollywood
mainstream films are shown. In addition, a local operator has three
venues, the Friedrichsbau/Apollo cinemas (four halls), the Kandelhof
(one hall) and the Harmonie (six halls), which are used as program
cinemas. These cinemas, which are part of the Europa Cinemas network,
have consistently received awards for their high quality programmes, in
2007 they were the first in Germany to receive the Europa Cinemas Award
for the best program design. They received five awards from the Federal
Republic of Germany's cinema program and distributor awards for 2017. In
summer there is an open-air cinema from this organizer in the courtyard
of the Black Monastery. Until 2015, the Freiburg Film Festival took
place every summer in Friedrichsbau and Harmonie, presenting mostly
Freiburg premieres of art house films.
The non-commercial
municipal cinema Freiburg has also received several awards for its
program work. Every two years, the municipal cinema organizes the
Freiburg Film Forum with a focus on ethnographic films. It is considered
one of the most important film festivals in this field in Germany.
As one of the oldest student film clubs in Germany, the Academic
Film Club Freiburg, founded in 1957 at the University of Freiburg e. V.
its own program. This is presented up to five times a week during the
semester with a 35 mm projector and with a digital projector in a large
lecture hall of the University's Collegiate Building II. From the winter
semester 2019/20, during the renovation of KG II, the performances will
take place in the large lecture hall of the biology in Herdern.
The Schwule Filmwoche Freiburg, one of the oldest gay festivals in
German-speaking countries, has been taking place since 1985. Until 2000,
the gay film week was a guest in the municipal cinema, since 2001 all
screenings have been in the Kandelhof.
Kool Filmdistribution is
based in Freiburg, an independent distributor of international art house
and independent films founded in 1997. About seven films with up to 50
prints are released in this way every year, e.g. The Butterfly with
Michel Serrault, The Great Seduction or Back to Dalarna.
Freiburg
was also discovered as a film location. Mostly romantic TV comedies like
Der Vollgasmann or Some like it happy are created here. There was also
the drama Zeit der Zimmerbrande with Uwe Ochsenknecht and Tatort: Fünf
Minuten Himmel with Heike Makatsch. The first episode of the new Tatort
Schwarzwald was filmed in 2016, in which Freiburg only plays a role as
the headquarters of the police department. The 1977 Italian horror film
Suspiria is also set in Freiburg (in the Haus zum Walfisch) but was
mostly shot abroad. In autumn 2020, the second season of the television
series Biohackers was filmed in Freiburg, including at the university
library. ZDF started in October 2021 with the new crime series Breisgau
in the evening program.
On the occasion of the 900th anniversary
of the city, the SWR 2020 put numerous historical reports about Freiburg
with the label SWR Retro in the ARD media library.
Freiburg is home to several municipal museums, most of which have
developed from the earlier "Municipal Collections". The city's largest
museum is the Augustinermuseum (museum for art and cultural history on
the Upper Rhine) on Augustinerplatz, one of the most important museums
in southern Baden. One department of the Augustinian Museum is the
Museum of City History, which has been housed in the Wentzingerhaus on
Münsterplatz since 1994 and is primarily concerned with the development
of Freiburg and the construction of the Freiburg Cathedral. Also on
Augustinerplatz is the Freiburg Natural History Museum, which provides
an overview of geology and mineralogy as well as the local flora and
fauna. The show "From Egg to Chick", which is presented annually in the
weeks before Easter, is not only extremely popular with children.
Another municipal museum is the Museum of Contemporary Art in
Marienstrasse, which opened in 1985 as a department of the
Augustinermuseum. Modern and contemporary art is exhibited here, from
Expressionism at the beginning of the 20th century to current
developments in recent years. The Colombischlössle Archaeological Museum
(formerly the Museum of Prehistory and Early History) has been located
in the Colombipark on Rotteckring since 1983. The permanent exhibition
presents finds from the Paleolithic to the Middle Ages, including works
of art by Ice Age hunters and collectors in southern Baden, the oldest
glass bowl north of the Alps and evidence of medieval Freiburg. Family
afternoons, interactive tours and hands-on stations illustrate the
special features of each era. For example, activities for children are
offered several times a year, where they can try out how fire was made
in the Stone Age. In May 2012, the city's central art depot was
inaugurated in the Hochdorf commercial area.
The newly created
"Uniseum" in the "Old University" building shows exhibits from the
history of the university and shows the development of the university up
to the present day from 1952 is described (guided tour by appointment).
In the Turmstraße there is the Freiburg Fasnet Museum, in which
masks and costumes (Alemannic "Häs") and the history of the "Freiburger
Fasnet" are exhibited. – In the Schwabentor there is the pewter figure
hermitage, in which historical dioramas (e.g. on Martin Luther or the
Peasants' Wars) made of pewter figures are exhibited. The private Small
Stuck Museum is located in the Brühl district and is the only one of its
kind in Germany.
The Schauinsland visitor mine is located in
“Freiburg’s local mountain”, the Schauinsland. It is an important mine
in terms of town history, in which silver, lead and zinc ores were
mined. It is on the "Erzkasten" above Hofsgrund. Today it is run by a
private research group. It remains closed in the winter months.
Since the beginning of 2020, the municipal museums have made images of
what are now 2186 objects available in an online collection. Most are
free to use under the Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 International
license.
In 2023, the Documentation Center National Socialism
Freiburg is to be opened in the former traffic office. The Freiburg
branch of the state center for political education is also to move
there.
In addition to the above-mentioned municipal museums that show art
and numerous galleries, since October 2004 there has been the municipal
gallery for contemporary art, the Kunsthaus L6 at Lameystraße 6 in a
former telecommunications building in the Zähringen district. There are
studios for visual artists, rehearsal rooms for bands, a residential
studio for guest artists, an artist workshop and a hall for exhibitions
of contemporary art from the Freiburg region.
The Kunstverein
Freiburg, founded in 1827 and thus one of the oldest art associations in
Germany, presents current art in its exhibition hall, the former
swimming pool of the abandoned Marienbad in the old town.
There
are also a number of privately run exhibition spaces: international
contemporary art has been exhibited in the Paul Ege Art Collection PEAC,
owned by an electronics company in the northern industrial area, since
2004. The “Rosskopf Collection” of contemporary fine arts can also be
seen there in a permanent exhibition. - The "Foundation for Concrete Art
Roland Phleps" shows in its sculpture hall in the district of Zähringen
in particular steel sculptures of the namesake and in changing
exhibitions works by related artists.
In 2014, the municipal
council decided to set up an art commission. It is intended to advise
the city administration and the political bodies on urban design. The
municipal council appoints the five honorary experts from the fields of
fine arts, art education and architecture for five years.
The Reinhold Schneider Prize is the culture prize of the city of Freiburg im Breisgau, which was first awarded in 1960. As a rule, it is awarded every two years on a rotating basis for one of the categories specified by the municipal council. Originally these were “literature”, “music” and “fine arts”. In 2018, "Performing Arts" and "Photography, Film and New Media" were added as additional categories.
The dialect boundary between Low and High Alemannic runs through the western parts of Freiburg, so the city has both types of dialect. In the north of Freiburg, Lower Alemannic is spoken, which is common in the districts of Emmendingen and Ortenau. The south, on the other hand, tends towards High Alemannic, which is native to the district of Lörrach and southern Breisgau. (St.Georgen, Haslach, Weingarten, Stühlinger, Opfingen and Tiengen belong to the High Alemannic dialect area, the other parts of the city belong to the Lower Alemannic dialect area). Freiburg's Alemannic name is – as it was at the time the city was founded – Friburg. However, the original Freiburg dialect has largely given way among the locals to a more or less Low Alemannic tinged High German colloquial language, which, like Swabian, has diphthongized and lost many Alemannic characteristics.
A cable car leads to the nearby Schauinsland mountain in the Upper
Black Forest.
In addition to the various vantage points (see above),
which are mostly on smaller peaks around Freiburg, it is also worth
hiking to the ruins of the Schneeburg Castle above the well-known
district of Vauban (terminus of tram 3 or Sankt Georgen station) in the
south of Freiburg. Near the summit of the same name you have a great
view of the Vosges in the west and the southern Rhine plain with its
vineyards.
There is a large network of bicycle and mountain bike trails around
Freiburg. For example, bike day tours on the Kaiserstuhl or on bike
paths along the Rhine come into question.
The Black Forest offers
challenging bike tours with lots of altitude difference. A beautiful
cycle path signposted from the Dreisam leads to Titisee-Neustadt (900m).
One-way route 42km (from city center) which is mostly paved. Leads via
Oberried through the Zastlertal south of the main traffic near the
Feldberg up to 1200m. A detour on foot to the summit (2.5 km) is
possible. The way back is highly recommended as a round trip along the
little-used L128 (Titisee-Neustadt-Sankt Märgen-Kirchzarten).
There are many opportunities for mountain biking in the Black Forest.
A number of routes specially designed for mountain bikers are located
directly on the Roßkopf and on the Schauinsland just outside the city
gates.
To swim
In summer you can swim in several bathing lakes in
the western parts of the city and at quarry ponds in the city area
(Flückigersee, Dietenbachsee) and a few km west of the city (Tunisee
with water ski facilities, Opfinger See).
Freiburg has several indoor
and outdoor pools. Many citizens also sunbathe on the banks of the
Dreisam in summer.
Since 1979, visitors to the Eugen-Keidel-Bad in
Freiburg's Mooswald have bathed in mineral thermal water from the
state-approved healing spring. The thermal bath was originally designed
as a health and healing bath, but today it is also a popular wellness
and leisure destination. The pool offers five different pools with water
temperatures between 28°C and 41°C (one warm and one colder pool
outdoors), a fitness level, a large separate sauna area with a Turkish
steam bath, natural bathing lake and a spacious outdoor area with a
sunbathing lawn and Kneipp pool and children's playground.
In
Titisee-Neustadt in the Upper Black Forest there is a huge fun pool with
a large sauna and slide area.
City walks with the Freiburg Greeters: Under the motto "Come as a guest, leave as a friend", the Freiburg Greeters offer free city tours. The guests get to know the city off the beaten track from the perspective of the locals. The greeters are happy to show the guests their city in an authentic way, with all its rough edges. Personal stories and experiences or tips for going out and leisure are also discussed. In the concrete agreement between guest and greeter, topic requests are taken into account, which thus turn these walks into a personal and individual encounter with the city. In order to preserve individuality, the greets are only carried out in small groups of up to 6 people. More information at freiburg-greeters.de The Freiburg Greeters are members of the International Greeter Association (formerly Global Greeter Network).
Groups can travel in historic trams. There are also public rides on
selected dates.
Trend sports such as parkour, disc golf and
slacklining have infrastructure in the Dietenbachpark
The main shopping street is Kaiser-Joseph-Straße (usually called
KaJo) running north-south in the city center. After the almost complete
destruction of Freiburg's city center in the Second World War, it was
rebuilt with arcades and converted into a pedestrian zone in the 1970s.
The KaJo offers three large department stores that are known from other
cities. Smaller shops and boutiques can be found mainly in the areas
around the cathedral and the town hall.
In addition to the main
shopping street, there are many small streets and alleys with numerous
small, individual shops. This includes the Gerberau, which is located in
the heart of the beautiful old town. These side streets are of
particular interest to those who are not just looking for 1Euro shops.
On the Münsterplatz there is a nice market with local specialties
and handicrafts on weekdays from 7.30 a.m. to 1.30 p.m. (Saturdays until
2 p.m.). The stands of the producers are on the north side of the
Minster, and those of the traders are on the south side. The Freiburg
Münstermarkt is also known for its flowers.
Freiburg offers something for every culinary taste. In addition to
the system catering establishments to be found in every city, there is a
large number of individually managed localities with regional or
international specialties in every price range.
The ostrich
farms, or ostriches for short, are a regional specialty. These ostriches
are run seasonally by farmers or (wine) farmers and only offer regional
and seasonal specialties from their own cultivation. These ostriches are
located on the outskirts of Freiburg in the districts of FR-Munzingen,
FR-Tiengen, FR-Opfingen and FR-Waltershofen. Ostriches can also be found
in the neighboring towns. You can look up which ostriches offer what and
when they are open in the ostrich guide, which is available in tourist
information, in bookstores or at petrol stations, etc. On [1] you will
find an up-to-date overview of numerous ostriches in the area.
Another specialty and traditional fast food is the "Lange Rote" in
Weckle. Fried onions, ketchup and/or mustard are served with it.
Available at various stands around Münster.
Cheap
There is an
enormously large selection of different (quick) dishes for lunch or in
the evening after the cinema in the market hall on Grünwalderstraße near
the Bertoldsbrunnen. There is something for everyone here, from Asian
and European cuisine to South American specialties and Persian dishes.
Open until midnight on weekends (Fri and Sat), closed on Sundays and
public holidays.
There are cheap fast food stalls near the train
station, e.g. the Chinese at the tram bridge (north side) in the
direction of the city center.
The cheapest pizzeria is the
Firenze (at the victory monument) - at least if you want something more
than a margherita.
Freiburg is a high-priced doner kebab area,
the doner kebab costs €6-7 practically in the entire city center (summer
2022).
Egon 54, Egonstrasse 54, 79106 Freiburg im Breisgau. Email:
peterlischke@arcor.de. Everything is freshly cooked and the prices are
cheap. On Sundays and Mondays there is a 3-course menu for €10. The food
is delicious. Open: daily from 6 p.m.
Brennessel, Eschholzstraße 17,
79106 Freiburg (in the Stühlinger district). Tel: +49 (0)761 281187.
Offers good vegetarian food and spaghetti in the early evening at
student prices. Since this restaurant was the first with such an offer,
the Brennessel was also called the unofficial Mensa III in the past.
Feature: take away. Open: Tue-Sat: from 6 p.m.; Sun + public holiday:
from 5 p.m.
In the meantime, other restaurants also have cheap
spaghetti offers, e.g. B. the Atlantic and the pub Litfass.
Middle
Tizio, Rathausgasse 35. Tel.: +49 (0)761 2925 711. Upscale
Italian, highly recommended. Open: Mon-Sat: 9.30 a.m. - midnight.
Littelhaso, Lehener Strasse 13. Email: the.el.haso@gmail.com. Good vegan
and vegetarian dishes. Open: Only open for lunch.
Chada Thai,
Richard-Wagner-Str. 24 (in the Herdern district). Phone: +49 (0)761 88
15 79 05, email: freiburg@chadathai.de. Outstanding Thai cuisine (the
vegan fake duck is highly recommended).
Trattoria in the Primo
market, Bernhardstr. 6 (near Stadtgarten). Tel.: +49 (0)761 2922441.
Very good Italian food, especially many fish dishes at prices of around
10-15 euros. You are served at the table, but the bill is paid at the
till. Especially Italians come there.
The Bermuda Triangle, which is a good 5-minute walk from the main
train station in the direction of Bertoldsbrunnen (between Martinstor
and the university), is a fairly compact neighborhood with a lively and
notoriously boozy atmosphere. In its vicinity you can also ask your way
to quieter places, almost all of which are within walking distance.
Augustinerplatz is a popular meeting point, especially in the evenings
(see streets and squares). The online magazine fudder.de provides good
information about current events and nightlife.
Upscale
One
Trick Pony, Oberlinden 8, 79098 Freiburg (at the Schwabentor). Phone:
+49 (0)761 61250351, email: info@onetrickpony.bar. Triple winner of the
Mixology Bar Awards 2018, upscale (cocktail) bar with prices around 10
euros per cocktail, great atmosphere in the Freiburg underground, entire
bar for smokers, no entry under 18 years. Open: Mon-Sat 19:00-02:00.
Everyone will find suitable accommodation in Freiburg. From cheap
hotels to 5-star hotels (Colombi Hotel), everything is represented. Many
hotels are located directly in the beautiful old town or within walking
distance, so you don't necessarily have to travel by car.
Cheap
Black Forest Hostel, Kartäuserstr. 33, 79102 Fribourg. Tel.: +49 761 881
7870, fax: +49 761 881 7895, email: backpacker@blackforest-hostel.de.
Friendly hostel with a large self-catering kitchen, bed in a large room
€18, much more centrally located compared to the youth hostel (5
minutes' walk from Martinstor). Payment types accepted: debit card,
credit card.
Freiburg youth hostel, Kartäuserstraße 151. Quite
decentrally located.
Middle
The Hotel am Stadtgarten offers
beautiful, quiet rooms just a few minutes' walk from the Stadtgarten in
Freiburg. Single rooms are available from 67 euros and double rooms from
85 euros.
The Dorint Hotel An den Thermen - located in the "Mooswald"
nature reserve - offers 98 rooms and 5 suites as well as a mineral
thermal bath with sauna area on around 6,000 m². Prices from €109 per
room/night.
Freiburg is characterized by the Albert-Ludwigs University, which stretches across the entire city: Among Freiburg's 220,000 inhabitants there are 30,000 students. The university is very popular and has a good reputation in many disciplines. In addition, there are various technical colleges, a teacher training college, as well as the State College of Music and the Freiburg Drama School in the E-Werk.
Freiburg is considered the most criminal city in Baden-Württemberg. However, the number of crimes in Freiburg has fallen continuously since 2014. Expect pickpocketing and drug-related crime.
With the neighboring mountains providing good access to the Black Forest region, Freiburg offers a high level of recreational value for activities such as hiking, winter sports and water sports in the surrounding lakes. For wellness, in addition to the thermal baths in Bad Krozingen and Badenweiler, we can also recommend the Freiburg thermal baths in Keidel (see activities).
Church services
Holy Mass in cath. Churches in the city center:
Münster of Our Lady, Münsterplatz (800m from the main train station).
Sun: 07:00, 08:30, 10:00, 11:45, 20:00; Mon-Sat: 07:00, 08:00, 18:30;
Wed, Sat: also 09:00
St. Martin, Rathausplatz (600m from the main
train station). Sat: 18:00; Sun: 07:30, 09:30, 11:15; Tue-Sat: 07:00;
Mon, Tue, Fri, Sat: 09:00
Herz Jesu, Stühlinger Kirchplatz (rear of
the bus station). Sat: 19:00; Sun: 09:30 (Croat.), 11:00; Tue: 09:45;
Fri: 18:30
Overview of all catholic Sunday services in the city
deanery of Freiburg
Laundromats A self-service laundromat is located
on Egonstr. 25, just behind the main train station.
Fair clothing
There is a shop for this on Moltkestrasse and one in the Vauban quarter.
The first
mention of settlements in the area of today's Freiburg, the
Wiehre, Zähringen and Herdern, can be found in a document from the
year 1008. Around 1091 the Zähringer Duke Bertold II built the
Castrum de Friburch (Leopoldsburg ruins) on the Schlossberg.
Bertold's son Konrad granted the settlement of servants and
craftsmen at the foot of the mountain market and town rights in
1120. In place of the now too small church, Bertold V initiated the
generous construction of today's cathedral, the v. a. was financed
by the income of the silver mines in the Black Forest, which
contributed significantly to the prosperity of the Freiburg
citizens.
After the Zähringers died out, the Counts of Urach
took over the rule in 1218 and called themselves the Counts of
Freiburg from then on. After frequent quarrels with the counts about
finances, the citizens of Freiburg bought themselves in 1368 with
15,000 marks of silver from the reign of the unloved Egino III. go
and submit to the protection of the House of Habsburg.
Freiburg had to provide the new rulers with soldiers and financial
aid. In the Battle of Sempach, the Swiss Confederates won against
the Austrian Duke Leopold III in 1386. and wiped out a large part of
the Freiburg nobility. The guilds then ruled the city council.
Freiburg was an imperial city until 1427. In 1457, Archduke Albrecht
founded the University of Freiburg as lord of the Austrian
foothills.
In
1498 Maximilian I held the Reichstag in Freiburg. At the same time,
the farmers on the Upper Rhine rose up under the sign of the
Bundschuh, but the uprising near Freiburg under Joß Fritz in 1513
was betrayed. In 1525, during the German Peasants' War, farmers
under the leadership of Hans Müller took Freiburg and forced the
city council to join an evangelical-Christian association. When the
iconoclasts enforced Protestantism in Basel in 1529, the Prince of
Science Erasmus of Rotterdam and the Basel Cathedral Chapter fled to
Catholic Freiburg. With the completion of the high choir, which was
consecrated by the auxiliary bishop of Constance in 1513, the
cathedral was finally completed in 1536.
Shortly after the
beginning of the Thirty Years' War in 1620, the Jesuits took over
the University of Freiburg. In 1632 the Swedes under General Horn
occupied the town, which changed hands several times in the
following years. An imperial Bavarian army under the generals Franz
von Mercy and Jan van Werth took Freiburg in 1644. Then it came to
the battle of Freiburg between the Bavarians and Franco-Weimar
troops.
In the second half of the 17th century, under Louis XIV, there were repeated attacks on the right bank of the Rhine. After the Dutch War, Emperor Leopold I had to cede the city of Freiburg and its fiefs as well as Betzenhausen and Kirchzarten to the French crown in the Peace of Nijmegen in 1679. After Louis XIV had instructed Sébastien Le Prestre de Vauban to develop the city into a modern fortress, the king visited Freiburg in 1681 to personally assess the progress of the work. He stayed at the Basler Hof. In the Peace of Rijswijk in 1697, Louis XIV was allowed to keep the territories occupied in Alsace, including the free imperial city of Strasbourg, but had to return Freiburg to the Habsburgs. Towards the end of the War of the Spanish Succession, Marshal Claude-Louis-Hector de Villars occupied Freiburg again in 1713. In the second Austrian War of Succession, the French under Marshal François de Franquetot defeated the Austrians on July 5, 1744 near Weissenburg, besieged Freiburg and were finally able to take the city. When the French troops had to evacuate Freiburg, they thoroughly destroyed the fortifications. Only the Breisacher Tor remained as part of the Vauban buildings.
French revolutionary troops took Freiburg in 1796. After three months, Archduke Karl liberated the city. When the Duke of Modena Hercules III. lost his Italian possessions in the Peace of Campo Formio in 1797, four years later in 1801 in the Peace of Lunéville he received the Breisgau as compensation. Hercules III did not agree to this exchange, as he did not consider his losses to be sufficiently compensated. Therefore he did not visit the Breisgau after 1801. The business of government was conducted by Baron Hermann von Greiffenegg, who formally took possession of the Breisgau for the Este family on March 2, 1803. After Hercules' death in October 1803, the Breisgau fell to his daughter Maria Beatrice, who was married into the House of Habsburg. But this fashionable-Habsburg interlude lasted only for a short time, because by order of Napoleon, Breisgau and Ortenau fell to Baden in 1805, which had been an electorate since 1803. The final act of the Congress of Vienna in 1815 confirmed that Freiburg would remain with the Grand Duchy of Baden.
In 1821, Freiburg replaced Constance as the bishopric. In
1827 Freiburg became the seat of the newly founded Archdiocese of
Freiburg. In 1845 the railway line towards Offenburg was opened. The
revolution of 1848 had a particularly violent impact in south-west
Germany, although Baden had received a fairly liberal constitution
during the Restoration in 1818. There was bloody barricade fighting
in Freiburg, in which, in addition to Baden government troops,
Hessian associations were involved.
With the establishment of
the Empire in 1871, the city took part in the general economic boom
in Germany. Under Mayor Otto Winterer, Freiburg got its face with
the development of new districts in the style of historicism. An
electric tram started running as early as 1901.
During the
First World War, French planes bombed the open city of Freiburg on
December 14, 1914. The event shocked residents. When an air raid in
April 1915 killed an adult and seven children, it resulted in a wave
of people fleeing the city.
The return of Alsace to France
after the lost war hit Freiburg particularly hard economically.
Two Reich Chancellors
in the early years of the Weimar Republic came from Freiburg:
Constantin Fehrenbach and Joseph Wirth.
The National
Socialists also took power in Freiburg in 1933. The university was
brought into line under the rectorate of Martin Heidegger. In 1938,
the Freiburg synagogue went up in flames during the Night of the
Pogroms. In 1940, as part of the so-called Wagner-Bürckel campaign,
the Jews who remained in Freiburg were deported to the Gurs
internment camp in southern France.
The Luftwaffe mistakenly
carried out a bomb attack on Freiburg on May 10, 1940, in which 57
people were killed. Under the code name Operation Tigerfish, the
British Royal Air Force bombed the city on the evening of November
27, 1944, killing around 2,800 citizens. After the attack, only the
relatively undamaged Freiburg Minster rose from the ruins of the old
town, which had been completely destroyed in the northern part, but
the strong detonation waves had covered the nave. With new bricks
donated from Basel, the cathedral was almost completely covered
again by January 1946.
After General Charles de Gaulle was
awarded his own zone of occupation at the Yalta Conference in
February 1945 and the French 1st Army had crossed the Rhine near
Speyer at the end of March 1945, the 9th Colonial Infantry Division
stood before Freiburg in mid-April. The SS General Georg Keppler
(XVIII SS Army Corps) considered defending the city pointless and
pulled out “the defense forces (2 battalions) designated for this
purpose, contrary to the repeated express“ Führer order ”.
The "town surrenders almost without a fight" confirmed the French
Army General Lattre de Tassigny on April 21, 1945.
In October General de Gaulle held a victory parade in Freiburg. As a result of the division of Germany into different occupation zones, Freiburg became the capital of the newly founded state of Baden in 1946. The Prime Minister was Leo Wohleb, who was born in Freiburg and resided in the Colombischlössle while the state parliament met in the historic department store. After a referendum in 1951, South Baden was absorbed into the state of Baden-Württemberg - despite bitter resistance from broad sections of the population.
The student unrest of the late 1960s was also reflected in
Freiburg. In the 1970s, the growing political awareness led to the
participation of many Freiburg residents in the successful
resistance of the Kaiserstühler farmers against the planned Wyhl
nuclear power plant. As a result of these events, a strong
autonomous scene and a broad ecologically oriented spectrum
developed in the city. Freiburg became a stronghold of the newly
founded Greens and is therefore called the eco capital of Germany. A
climate also developed scientifically and economically in Freiburg
that has given the city a leading role as an environmental city - it
appeared at the Expo 2010 in Shanghai as the “Green City”.
Due to its convenient location and the universities and research
institutions, Freiburg has become increasingly a popular city for
congresses, trade fairs and meetings, especially the Freiburg
Concert Hall and the Freiburg Exhibition Center. International city
tourism plays a major role.
In 1986, the city hosted the
seventh state horticultural show in Baden-Württemberg, which was of
great importance for the development of the western districts and
also resulted in the establishment of the eco-station. A strong
population increase called for the expansion of old and the
construction of new residential areas. The internationally known
district of Vauban was built on the site of the former Vauban /
Schlageter barracks abandoned by the French garrison in 1992. In
1993 the groundbreaking ceremony for the new Rieselfeld district
took place.
In 1996 the city exceeded the population of
200,000. These include around 30,000 students studying at the
university and four other colleges.
The construction of a new
district has been under discussion since 2015 in order to counter
the housing shortage. The local council decided in favor of the
previously agriculturally used "Dietenbach" area, between Rieselfeld
and the Mitte feeder road. In 2018, an alliance of more than 15
initiatives collected over 12,500 signatures and thus brought about
a referendum on the planned Dietenbach district. On February 24,
2019, a majority voted in favor of the development of the Dietenbach
site in the referendum.
As the seat of the archbishopric and
ecclesiastical institutions such as the German Caritas Association,
Freiburg is a center of the Catholic Church. In 1978 the 85th German
Catholic Day took place in Freiburg. Mother Teresa attended. On
September 24th and 25th, 2011 Pope Benedict XVI visited as part of
his visit to Germany in Freiburg at the invitation of Robert
Zollitsch, the archbishop of Freiburg at the time and chairman of
the German Bishops' Conference. The pontiff celebrated, among other
things. a youth vigil at Freiburg airport and a Eucharist
celebration on September 25, 2011 with over 100,000 believers. He
also met victims of abuse, held talks with Helmut Kohl,
constitutional judges and the Presidium of the Central Committee of
German Catholics and gave an ecclesiological speech to 1,500 invited
guests in the Freiburg Concert Hall.
The city's 900th
anniversary celebration in 2020 was interrupted in March by the
COVID-19 pandemic and the associated protective measures and has
therefore been extended until July 2021. For a few weeks in summer
and autumn 2020, the celebrations continued with small and
medium-sized events.
Due to its location in the trinational metropolitan region of the Upper Rhine and as a neighboring city, From Strasbourg, Freiburg is becoming increasingly important for the growing together of Europe. The city is the seat of consulates and honorary consulates of various European countries. The regional council of Friborg, the city administration, the University of Friborg and many other institutions work closely with partner organizations in the neighboring countries of France and Switzerland. As a city that belonged to the Kingdom of France towards the end of the 17th century (1677–1697) and was the site of a large garrison of the French occupying forces after the Second World War, Freiburg has always played a pioneering role in relations with the neighboring country. Freiburg works particularly closely with the French cities of Mulhouse and Colmar. The French play an important role as workers and customers in the Freiburg economic region. The “Center culturel français” (CCF) Conrad Schroeder and the University's France Center make important contributions to the cultural and political relations between the two countries. In 2001 and 2010, Franco-German summits of the heads of state and government took place in Freiburg. Close relationships have always existed with the neighboring Swiss city of Basel (see Erasmus von Rotterdam and Basler Hof), which are still maintained today.
Freiburg is located in the south-west of Baden-Württemberg on the
south-eastern edge of the Upper Rhine Rift Valley and largely in the
Freiburg Bay and at the western foot of the Black Forest. The
closest major cities are: Mulhouse (French: Mulhouse) in Alsace,
about 46 kilometers to the southwest, Basel, about 51 kilometers to
the south, Strasbourg, about 66 kilometers to the north, Zurich,
about 85 kilometers to the southeast, Karlsruhe, about 120
kilometers to the north and Stuttgart, about 133 kilometers
northeast of Freiburg. The Dreisam flows through Freiburg.
The expansion of the city in north-south direction is 18.6
kilometers, in east-west direction 20 kilometers. It is 3 kilometers
from the district boundary to the French border and 42 kilometers to
the Swiss border. Freiburg has an altitude difference of over 1000
meters, from Waltershofen 196 m above sea level. to the Schauinsland
1284 m above sea level.
The street name "Auf der Zinnen" is
reminiscent of the city's former city wall. The 48th parallel north
of it runs about 200 meters north of it. The place is highlighted on
both sides of the north-south thoroughfare, which is called
Habsburgerstrasse here, by writing in paving stones of different
colors, so that the geographical latitude is recognizable.
The following cities and municipalities border the city of Freiburg; they are called clockwise, starting in the north, and are all in the Breisgau-Hochschwarzwald district, with the exception of Vörstetten, which belongs to the Emmendingen district: Vörstetten, Gundelfingen, Glottertal, Stegen, Kirchzarten, Oberried (Breisgau), Münstertal / Black Forest, Bollschweil, Horben , Au (Breisgau), Merzhausen, Ehaben, Schallstadt, Bad Krozingen, Breisach am Rhein, Merdingen, Gottenheim, Umkirch and March.
Freiburg lies on the border between the Black Forest and
the Upper Rhine Rift Valley. This elongated fault runs through the
middle of the city. The eastern districts are in a connecting valley
to the Zartener basin between the mountains Roßkopf in the north and
Brombergkopf in the south. The southern districts of Kappel and
Günterstal are already in the Black Forest. The Schlossberg, an
extension of the foothills zone, protrudes like a nose directly into
the inner city area. The rock below the so-called
Greifenegg-Schlössle and in the western area of the Augustinerweg
was extracted for the construction of the high medieval city wall.
With the 1284 meter high Schauinsland to the southeast, the
summit of one of the highest mountains in the Black Forest is part
of the Freiburg urban area. At more than 1000 meters, Freiburg is
one of the major German cities with the greatest difference in
altitude within the urban area. Most of the western districts are
located on an alluvial cone that was formed during the last ice age.
In the south lies the Schönberg, which is part of the foothills
zone, part of the old mountain range, and which only partially
slipped when the Upper Rhine Rift collapsed.
The following seven nature reserves exist in the city of
Freiburg. This means that 593.1 hectares of the urban area are under
nature protection, that is 3.85 percent, see also the list of nature
reserves in Freiburg im Breisgau.
Arlesheimer See: 22.8 ha;
Tiengen district
Freiburg Rieselfeld: 257.0 ha; Districts
Mundenhof, Rieselfeld, Opfingen and Waltershofen
Gaisenmoos: 25.5
ha; Tiengen district
Honigbuck: 7.5 ha; District Sankt Georgen
Humbrühl-Rohrmatten: 25.8 ha (of which 21.0 ha in the city of
Freiburg); Waltershofen district
Mühlmatten: 39.0 ha (of which
19.6 ha in the city of Freiburg); Hochdorf district
Schauinsland:
1,053.9 ha (of which 239.7 ha in the city of Freiburg); Günterstal
and Kappel districts
In addition to these nature reserves,
there are also landscape protection areas, see also the list of
landscape protection areas in Freiburg im Breisgau. In the past few
decades, the municipal, official nature conservation was in part not
able to meet all the objectives of the municipal protected area
ordinances. Freiburg has had a tree protection statute since 1997.
Nevertheless, there are always disputes about the felling of trees.
Freiburg lies in a zone with a warm and humid temperate climate, although there are big differences: on the plains it is warmer and drier, in the mountain areas it is cooler and more humid. With a mean average temperature of 11.4 ° C, Freiburg is one of the warmest cities in Germany. During the heat wave of 2003 on August 13th, 40.2 degrees were officially measured. For a long time this was the second highest temperature ever registered in Germany. Since the reference period 1961–1990, the average annual mean temperature has increased from 9.7 ° C to 11.4 ° C (reference period 1981–2010), and in the reference period 1990–2018 even to 11.8 ° C.
The mean annual rainfall of 837 mm is hardly higher than the
long-term German average of a good 800 mm. Most of the precipitation
falls in the summer months of May to August with a peak of 107 mm in
June. The lowest precipitation falls in February with 50.6 mm.
Freiburg is the location of the Center for
Medical-Meteorological Research of the German Weather Service. It
opened in 2018 at its location in Stefan-Meier-Str. 4 the fifth of a
total of ten urban climate stations planned in Germany in order to
get measured values of the densely built-up cities in which more
than 70 percent of the population lives and works. Compared to the
measuring station at Freiburg Airport, the temperatures here can be
up to 10 ° C higher. The aim is to react better to climate change.
A specialty of the city's summer climate is the “hell valleys”
named after the hell valley to the east. Some time after dark, the
mountain wind from the heights of the Black Forest ventilates parts
of the city with great regularity. According to weather experts such
as Jörg Kachelmann or Hans von Rudloff, this wind is not cool, as is
often assumed and often felt, but rather warm, like a blow dryer.
The downward wind should therefore bring the city most tropical
nights in Germany with temperatures consistently above 20 ° C.
Freiburg has 28 districts, which are divided into 42 districts, mainly for statistical purposes. The local constitution was introduced in the districts of Ebnet, Hochdorf, Kappel, Lehen, Munzingen, Opfingen, Tiengen and Waltershofen, which were incorporated into the district reform of the former Freiburg district. Thus, these places received a local council to be elected by the local citizenship at the same time as the local council with a local mayor at the top, as well as a local administration. The local councils are to be heard on all important matters relating to the locality. The final decision on a measure, however, rests with the municipal council of the city of Freiburg.
In the late Middle Ages and early modern times, between 5,000 and
10,000 people lived in Freiburg. Freiburg was the largest city between
Basel and Strasbourg. Population growth only accelerated with the start
of industrialization in the 19th century. If the city had 9,050
inhabitants in 1800, by 1900 there were already 62,000. In 1934, the
population exceeded 100,000 for the first time, making Freiburg a big
city.
During World War II, the city was the target of Allied air
raids. The population fell by 18.9 percent from 110,110 in 1939 to
89,275 in December 1945. As early as 1947, the number of inhabitants
exceeded the 100,000 mark again due to refugees and expellees from
eastern Germany. By 1996, this number had doubled to 200,000, also due
to numerous incorporations of surrounding villages, a limit that has not
been fallen below since.
With a population growth of 32 percent
between 1980 and 2012, the city is growing as one of the fastest in the
country. In 2009, the urban district was the district with the largest
increase in Baden-Württemberg with an increase of 1954 inhabitants, in
2011 it was in second place behind Stuttgart.
With an average age
of its residents of 41 years, the urban district of Freiburg was at the
top of the districts in Baden-Württemberg in 2011. The proportion of
foreigners as of January 1, 2013 was 13.7 percent.
In addition to
the official resident population figure of the State Statistical Office,
there is another official population figure with the population update
of the municipal residents' registration office, which with 210,277
inhabitants as of January 1, 2012 is significantly below the figure of
229,144 inhabitants updated by the state authority. The city currently
receives 750 euros per year as an allocation from the state for each
inhabitant registered with the state statistical office. If the figures
from the municipal register of residents were to be taken over by the
State Statistical Office, this would mean a loss of income of around 15
million euros per year, which is not in the interest of the city. The
population figures determined by the 2011 census for federal, state and
local authorities were published on May 31, 2013 and, at 210,600
inhabitants, are below the population figures previously provided by the
State Statistical Office.
A nickname for Freiburg-born residents is Bobbele. It is generally
said that only someone who was born in the St. Elisabeth Hospital on
Dreisamstrasse is a real Bobbele. The hospital was set up in 1928 by
Mathilde Otto as a home for women in childbed, where women from humble
backgrounds could recover from childbirth. There were births later. The
maternity ward was closed in 2002 and the clinic in 2012. St. Joseph's
Hospital adopted the name of St. Elisabeth for its maternity ward. As
city historian Peter Kalchthaler says, the term Bobbele already existed
earlier: "The Protestant pastor Johann Philipp Glock, who worked in
Wolfenweiler from 1897 to 1916, like many of his colleagues dealt with
history and folklore and published scientifically. In 1909 he published
the Breisgauer Volksspiegel, in which he describes his experiences. He
let the country people tell their story; he asked her about her
proverbs. How do you say when a child is born? How do you say when you
drive the cattle out in the fall? What are your weather rules? The term
Bobbele appears several times in this systematic listing.” The rural
population south of Freiburg called the people of Freiburg that.
Kalchthaler explains a theory of how the term came about with the
university professor Franz-Josef Bob. In the time of Maria Theresa he
created the first Freiburg "normal school". There was a saying,
certainly long before 1928: "Children's Bobbele drink another
Schoppele". So some think that Bob's students were just the Bobbele. But
in Alemannic one often says Bobbele for a small child.
In Middle
High German there is the first name Popo, which became Poppele in the
diminutive form. It is also used for babies. So it could be that in the
Elisabeth Hospital at the births it was said: "Here we have a sweet
Bobbele again". Kalchthaler therefore considers it unlikely that the
term was invented in the Elisabeth Hospital. To this day, the Friends of
the Sisters of St. Elizabeth issue a Bobbele certificate.
In
2017, Judith Velminski and Sabine Kuhn designed a character they called
"Bobbele". In the course of this, they had the term "Bobbele" protected
in 8 of 34 possible categories for ten years at the German Patent and
Trademark Office (DPMA) in Munich, which angered a t-shirt manufacturer
and an entertainer. The DPMA register contains further entries on
Bobbele, for example from the Pfeifle bakery and the Dettlinger office
machine company.
The number of people leaving has risen sharply in both major national churches. In 2018, the registry office had already registered a high number of people leaving the church, and in 2019 there were significantly more: 2,034 people declared their departure from the church at the Freiburg registry office, 392 more than in the previous year.
The Heiliggeistspitalstiftung Freiburg was first mentioned in 1255.
The city belonged to Austria until 1805 and thus remained Catholic,
while surrounding villages such as Haslach, Opfingen and Tiengen and
entire areas that were under the jurisdiction of the Margrave of Baden
became Protestant in the course of the Reformation. From an
ecclesiastical point of view, the city belonged to the Diocese of
Constance until 1821. In the same year, Freiburg became the seat of a
Roman Catholic archbishop, who, however, could only take office in 1827
due to differences between the Baden government and the Holy See. The
borders of the archdiocese of Freiburg coincide with the borders of the
former state of Baden and the former Prussian principality of
Hohenzollern. The Freiburg Minster is the episcopal church. The
ecclesiastical province of Freiburg includes the two suffragan
bishoprics of Mainz and Rottenburg-Stuttgart and, until 1929, the
bishoprics of Limburg and Fulda. The Archbishop of Freiburg bears the
title of Metropolitan (Upper Rhine Church Province). The German Caritas
Association is based in Freiburg.
Saint George (the Freiburg flag
shows the George cross), Bishop Lambert of Liège and the catacomb saint
Alexander are venerated as Freiburg city patrons. There are numerous
depictions of these saints in the Freiburg Minster, on the Minster
Square and in the city's museums and archives, including those by Hans
Baldung Grien, Hans Holbein the Younger and Gregorius Sickinger.
When the Breisgau fell to the Grand Duchy of Baden, which was governed
by Protestant princes, in 1805, more and more Protestants moved to the
city. During the negotiations between the government of Baden and the
city council of Freiburg, the city council offered to build a Protestant
church in order to get the people of Karlsruhe to support the
preservation of the university. The Freiburg Protestants belong today,
unless they are members of a free church, to the City Deanery of
Freiburg, newly formed in January 2007, within the church district of
South Baden of the Evangelical Church in Baden. The seat of the
Evangelical Lutheran Church in Baden, a Lutheran free church, is located
in Freiburg. There is also a wide range of other Protestant free
churches: the Calvary Chapel in the city, the Chrischona community, the
Christian community in Lehen, the Christian missionary community, the
Evangelical Free Church community (Baptists), the Free Evangelical
community, the Salvation Army, the Liebenzell community, the Mennonite
Church and the Methodist Church.
There has been an Old Catholic
community in Freiburg since the late 19th century, whose church is the
former monastery church of the Ursulines in the Black Monastery on the
edge of the old town. The Catholic Church of Maria Schutz was made
available to the Greek, Serbian, Russian and Romanian Orthodox
communities for their services.
In Freiburg there is also an
Anglican congregation and the New Apostolic Church, a congregation of
the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints, the anthroposophically
influenced Christian Community, the Jesus Freaks and the Jehovah's
Witnesses.
After Jews had already been in the city before 1230, a community is
said to have formed in the Webergasse area since 1230. In 1310, the
Counts of Freiburg had acquired the lucrative Jewish regiment from the
Emperor, i. H. the taxes of the Jews living in Freiburg went directly to
Konrad and his co-ruling son Friedrich. On October 12, 1338, they issued
the resident Jews with a comprehensive letter of security and freedom.
But already on January 1, 1349, this was no longer worth anything.
Although the plague had not yet broken out in Freiburg, Jews were
suspected of having spread it and were arrested. All Freiburg Jews, with
the exception of pregnant women, were burned on January 31, 1349. The
children of the murdered were forced to be baptized. After this pogrom,
Jews reluctantly settled in Freiburg again. In 1401, the city council
passed a decree that no Jew could ever live in Friburg, which King
Sigismund officially confirmed with the eternal expulsion in 1424. It
was only in 1809 that the Jews were again allowed to reside permanently
in the city, and in 1836 they founded a Jewish community.
During
the pogrom night of 1938, the National Socialists set fire to the
synagogue built in 1870, vandalized and plundered numerous shops and
apartments belonging to Jews in Freiburg without the police or fire
brigade intervening. They abducted the wealthy male Jewish residents to
protective custody in concentration camps (Buchenwald and Dachau) in
order to force them to emigrate and to Aryanize their assets. On October
22, 1940, the Nazis deported the remaining Baden Jews together with the
Palatinate Jews to the Camp de Gurs camp in southern France. One of the
meeting points in Freiburg was Annaplatz in Wiehre. In the city's
pavement, "stumbling blocks" commemorate the victims of the persecution
of the Jews during the Nazi regime. Two stumbling blocks were even
dedicated to the journalist Käthe Vordtriede of the Volkswacht, the
first in front of the Vordtriede house in Freiburg in 2006 and the
second in front of the regional council in Freiburg or Basler Hof in the
spring of 2013. This was the seat of the Gestapo or Secret State Police
until 1941. Unwelcome people were cruelly interrogated, imprisoned and,
in the worst case, deported. The only solution left was flight or
emigration. The Vordtriede family was lucky and managed to escape in
time.
After 1945 a new unified Jewish community was formed, the
Israelitische Gemeinde Freiburg, which has now grown to around 750
members due to the immigration of Jews from the former Soviet Union.
Benjamin Soussan, the community's rabbi from 1991 to 2010, introduced
the Orthodox rite. From 1985 to 1987 the community built a new synagogue
between Münsterplatz and Stadtgarten. Since July 2004, another community
has been added by the small egalitarian Jewish Chawurah Gescher, which
has joined the Union of Progressive Jews.
There are separate
burial grounds for the deceased inhabitants of the Jewish faith: the
Jewish cemetery on Elsässer Strasse and a new burial ground in the St.
Georgen cemetery.
Several Islamic organizations of different origins and religious orientations maintain a total of four places of worship and mosques in Freiburg. Adherents of Buddhism can find contact points in the Tibet Kailash house, which was visited by the Dalai Lama in 2007, or in the Buddhist center of the Karma Kagyu school. Finally, there is a small Bahá'í community of about 20 members.
In the 2011 census, 24.2% of the residents stated that they were Protestant, 38.1% Roman Catholic and 37.7% were non-denominational, belonged to another religious community or made no statement. The number of Protestants and Catholics has since fallen. At the end of 2022, 28.7% (65,621) of residents were Catholic, 18.7% were Protestant, and 53% were non-denominational or members of other denominations or religions. At the end of 2019, 32.1% (72,786) of the residents were Catholic, 20.5% were Protestant and 47.4% were non-denominational or members of other denominations or religions.
In 1962, Eugen Keidel, a social democrat, was elected mayor for the first time in Freiburg, which used to be Catholic and conservative. He was succeeded in 1982 by his party colleague Rolf Böhme, who left in 2002. The city is now considered a stronghold of the Greens. This is reflected not only in the election of the first green mayor of a major German city, Dieter Salomon, but also in consistently above-average election results. In the federal elections of 2002 and 2005, the constituency of Freiburg was the best constituency for this party nationwide with 25.0 and 22.8 percent of the second votes respectively. After the Greens achieved 36.8 percent in the 2004 European elections in the city district, the CDU again prevailed as the strongest political force in the state elections in March 2006 with 30.3 percent. In the state elections of 2011, however, the result of the Greens increased again with 34.5 (Freiburg I) and 39.9 percent (Freiburg II) in line with the state-wide trend.
Before 1806, the head of the city administration was the mayor as
chairman of the court. With the transfer of the Breisgau to Baden, the
Freiburg city law of 1520 was repealed and the Baden municipal
constitution was introduced with a directly elected mayor at the head of
the administration. Johann Josef Adrians, who was still elected mayor of
the city by the guilds, was confirmed in office in 1806 and honored with
the title of mayor, but the municipal code of Baden considerably
restricted Freiburg's municipal self-government. A city manager
appointed by the government was in charge. From 1832 the Freiburg city
leaders bore the title of mayor and only from 1875 did they call
themselves mayors again.
The mayor of Freiburg is also the voting
chairman of the municipal council.
In the 2018 mayoral election
on May 6, the non-party Martin Horn, supported by the SPD, was elected
with 44.2 percent in the second ballot on May 6, with a turnout of 51.7
percent. With 34.7 percent, he had already received the most votes in
the first ballot. His three competitors came up with the following
results in the second ballot: incumbent Dieter Salomon (Greens) received
30.7 percent, Monika Stein (alliance of independent women, the GAF, the
Left List, the Left and Young Freiburg) received 24.1 percent of the
votes cast and Anton Behringer (independent) 0.9 percent. Horn held
office until March 5, 2019 as executor, since Friedhild Miller had filed
a lawsuit against the election.
Chantal Kopf (Bündnis 90/Die Grünen) has held the direct mandate in the German Bundestag for the constituency of Freiburg since 2021. Claudia Raffelhüschen (FDP), who was inferior to her, entered the Bundestag via the state list. Freiburg is represented by three MPs in the 15th state parliament of Baden-Württemberg: Daniela Evers (Bündnis 90/Die Grünen, direct mandate) for the Freiburg-Ost constituency and Nadyne Saint-Cast for the Freiburg-West constituency (Bündnis 90/Die Grünen, direct mandate) and Gabi Rolland (SPD).
The coat of arms of the city of Freiburg shows a continuous red cross
on a white background. It is the attribute of St. George, the oldest
patron of the city. The city seal shows a stylized castle in red on a
white background with two trumpeters on the outer towers. This seal is
only occasionally represented in color in the city area; On the other
hand, this depiction, cast in iron, can be seen more frequently on the
manhole covers in the inner city. The stylized castle served as a model
for the Freiburg moated castle built in Sternwald in 1896.
You
often see a coat of arms with a black eagle or raven head on a gold
background. This coat of arms was created after 1327 from the Freiburg
mint mark. Initially, the coins minted in Freiburg showed the
outstretched eagle, i.e. the coat of arms of the Counts of Freiburg.
After the people of Freiburg had bought the right to mint coins from the
counts in 1327, the city minted coins that only showed the head of an
eagle to distinguish them. This was soon regarded as the head of a raven
(Alemannic "Rappen"), which is why the small coin was also known as a
"Rappenpfennig". In 1399, Freiburg and other Upper Rhine towns such as
B. Basel to facilitate trade among themselves the Rappenmünzbund. The
Rappenpfennig gave the Swiss Rappen its name. The coat of arms of the
city is often shown on historical buildings or paintings together with
the coat of arms of Austria, a reference to the city's long affiliation
with Western Austria.
As in the coat of arms, the flag of the
city of Freiburg shows the Georgskreuz, a continuous red cross on a
white background. It is identical to the flag of England, whose patron
saint is Saint George, as in Freiburg. It is mainly hoisted as an
upright flag, but can also be seen horizontally. This flag has been in
use since around 1368 when Freiburg came under the Habsburgs.
Referendums
So far, six referendums have taken place in Freiburg:
Construction of today's concert hall (1988)
Airfield Preservation
(1995)
Routing of the Haslach Stadtbahn (1999)
Sale of municipal
housing (2006)
Construction of a new stadium for SC Freiburg in
Wolfswinkel (2015)
Construction of the new district of Dietenbach
(2019)
The votes had a turnout between 22 percent (1999) and 50
percent (1988). An improvement in the chances of success of referendums
can be attributed to the reduction in the quorum from 30 to 25 percent
by resolution of the state parliament in 2005; In 2015, a state law
reduced it to 20 percent.
In November 2006, in the first
successful decision initiated by the Citizens' Initiative Wohnen ist
Menschenrecht (WiM), the large majority decided that the city should
remain the owner of the municipal apartments.
Since the 1970s, forms of cooperative-democratic citizen
participation have increasingly been carried out in Freiburg. They are
also called extended civic participation (i.e. civic participation that
goes beyond what is required by law).
Two reasons for the
increase in participation in political decisions are given in Freiburg:
on the one hand, this is a response to the increasing self-confidence
and demand of the citizens for participation in the community. On the
other hand, civic participation is seen as a form of recognition and
appreciation of civic engagement. Observations show that a municipality
that opens up more opportunities for co-decision also tends to have more
committed citizens.
The following forms of extended citizen
participation can be observed in Freiburg (classified according to
increasing reach):
Participation in decision-making about individual
projects, e.g. B. a children's playground
Participation in
development plans or district development plans (e.g. in the form of
district assemblies)
Participation in city-wide plans such as traffic
development plan, culture development plan, land use plan, budget plan.
There was extensive multi-year participation for the 2020 land use plan.
Public participation in the budget was the first in 2008 with the
participatory budget, which was related to the 2009/2010 double budget.
Since then it has been carried out every two years for the double
budget.
Participation in the strategic control of the entire
municipality: Freiburg's local Agenda 21 process has existed since a
municipal council decision in 1996, in which citizens, administration
and local politics jointly agree on goals and measures for Freiburg's
sustainable development. There has been a Freiburg Sustainability
Council since 2006, in which representatives from local politics, city
administration and civil society work together for this purpose under
the chairmanship of the Lord Mayor.
With citizen participation, a highly specialized infrastructure
supported by the city, welfare organizations and clubs has developed in
Freiburg since the early 1990s, which promotes honorary, voluntary
commitment:
A "Citizens' Engagement" department in Department III of
the city administration promotes engagement through the organization of
projects, through public recognition, public relations work and
networking. It also organizes individual citizen participation
processes.
The "Treffpunkt Freiburg" offers clubs and groups rooms
and technology for meetings, office work and events. It promotes
volunteers with further training related to their needs, through public
relations work, through target group-specific support and through
strategic work that aims to bring local politics, administration,
associations, etc. together in order to improve the promotion of
volunteering.
The "Freiburg Volunteer Agency" advises and places
people who are interested in volunteering and organizes further
training. In addition, she advises organizations that want to work
successfully with volunteers and promotes commitment through their own
projects, financial support, public recognition, public relations,
networking, target group-specific work, etc.
"The Freiburg Self-Help
Office" supports self-help groups in the establishment and ongoing work;
through advice, mediation and training.
The city's Agenda 21 office
supports the committees involved in the Agenda process and volunteer
project groups involved in the Agenda process.
The association COLOR
e. V. (free working group civic engagement) runs v. a. strategic work
and participates in the operation of the "Treffpunkt Freiburg".
Civic associations in the city center of Freiburg
Civic Association
Rieselfeld e. V
Civic Association Betzenhausen-Bischofslinde e. V
Citizens Association Brühl-Beurbarung e. V
Citizens' association
Freiburg-Landwasser e. V
Citizens Association Freiburg-St. George E.
V
Citizens Association Herdern e. V
Civic Association Littenweiler
e. V
Citizens' association Mittel- und Unterwiehre e. V
Citizens
Association Mooswald e. V
Citizens Association Oberwiehre-Waldsee e.
V
Bürgerverein Stühlinger e. V
Civic Association Weingarten e. V
Civic Association Zähringen e. V
Local association Freiburg-Haslach
e. V
Local association city center e. V
Local association
Günterstal e. V
District association Vauban e. V
The city is home to the football club SC Freiburg, which has played
in the first or second Bundesliga since 1978. In 2016, the club was
promoted to the top flight for the fifth time in its history. The
association became known throughout Germany for its particularly
constant personnel policy. Achim Stocker was President from 1972 until
his death in 2009. Long-time coach was Volker Finke (1991-2007), on
whose initiative the club's football school goes back. In 2004 SC
Freiburg celebrated its 100th anniversary. Coach since December 2011 is
Christian Streich. The women's team plays in the 1st Women's Bundesliga.
SC Freiburg has been playing in Europa Park Stadium since the
2021/2022 season. It has a capacity of 34,700 seats and was built next
to the airfield from 2018 to 2021. Before completion, the cost was
estimated at 76 million euros. Due to the Covid-19 pandemic,
construction was delayed by over a year and opened on October 7, 2021
with a friendly against FC St. Pauli. Before that, the venue of SC
Freiburg was in the Dreisamstadion.
In addition to SC Freiburg,
there is the Freiburg football club, which became German champion in
1907.
In ice hockey, EHC Freiburg (the "wolves") is currently
playing in the DEL2 (2021). In the 2003/2004 season, the EHC played in
the DEL, the highest division in German ice hockey. Its home is the
Echte Helden Arena in the Mooswald district.
The men's volleyball
team at FT 1844 Freiburg has been playing in the second Bundesliga since
2001.
In handball, the women's team at HSG Freiburg plays in the
3rd division.
Freiburg is represented in the first women's
basketball league by Eisvogel USC Freiburg. In the 2005/2006 season, the
kingfishers finished second in the second half of the season after the
end of the finals, and fourth in the 2006/2007 season. In 2021/2022, the
women's team became German champions, while the second women's team was
promoted to the second Bundesliga.
TV Freiburg Herdern has been
playing in the men's Prellball Bundesliga since the 2021/22 season and
in the women's from 2023/24.
The USC men's team is currently
(2022/23) playing in the Regionalliga Baden-Württemberg. The Freiburg
men's team played their last first-class season in 1998/1999, they were
last represented in the ProA (2nd Bundesliga) in 2010/11.
The
city is home to the Freiburg rugby club from 1982. As of June 2022, the
men's team plays in the Regionalliga Baden-Württemberg, the women's team
in the German 7-a-side rugby league. The club's home ground is in
March-Hugstetten, which has the only rugby pitch in the area.
Jenische from Freiburg won the world's first Bootsch tournament in 2005
in Singen in a mixed team.
American sports are also very popular
in Freiburg, not least because of the foreign guest students. The city
is represented in American football by the Freiburg Sacristans, who
played for the first time in the 2008 season in the Regionalliga Mitte
of the American Football Association Baden-Württemberg e. V. competed
and finished the season in third place. The Freiburg Knights play with
both the baseball and softball teams in the Baden-Württemberg
Association League of the BWBSV at their traditional location in the
Dietenbach area. In Freiburg there is also the lacrosse team PTSV Jahn
Freiburg Pumas, which has a men's team in the 1st Bundesliga South and a
women's team in the 1st Landesliga Baden-Württemberg and a men's team in
a syndicate with Constance. They are also represented as the
Freiburg-Stuttgart syndicate in the 1st Bundesliga South in box
lacrosse. Also based in PTSV Jahn Freiburg is the Freiburg Ultimate
Frisbee team DISConnection, whose mixed team competes in the 1st league
and thus the highest German division.
The Schützengesellschaft
Freiburg has been shooting in archery in the Bundesliga for many years.
The Freiburg-St. Georgen shoots air pistols in the South Baden League
and has also been active with the air rifle in the South Baden League.
Another important sport is cycling. On June 27, 1971, Freiburg im
Breisgau was both the stage finish and the starting point of the 1971
Tour de France. Three stages were held on this day. The first ran flat
from Mulhouse to Basel, the second from Basel via the Black Forest to
Freiburg and the third from Freiburg back to Mulhouse in Alsace. In
2000, Freiburg was a stage in the Tour de France for the fourth time. In
June 2004 the German Cycling Championships were held here, and in
November 2005 an international competition was held with the Indoor
Cycling World Championships.
Freiburg is the seat of the
Freiburg-Schwarzwald Olympic base, which maintains various performance
centers in the region: Nordic skiing, cycling, athletics and others. The
performance center for wrestling and a sports boarding school are
located in Freiburg. There is close cooperation with sports medicine and
sports science at the university.
In March 2004, the Freiburg
Marathon took place for the first time as a mass sporting event, which
has been held every spring since then.
With the Freiburger
Turnerschaft from 1844, the largest sports club in southern Baden has
its home in Freiburg. In 2004 he was awarded the contract to organize
the 54th World Roller Figure Skating Championships in Freiburg in 2009.
From 10th to 21st November 2009, around 1000 roller athletes from over
25 nations competed for the titles in ten disciplines.
The chess
club Freiburg-Zähringen 1887 e. V. is the largest and oldest chess club
in southern Baden. His women play in the women's second national chess
league. In the 1950s, Freiburg took part in German team championships
several times, along with Hamburg, Berlin, Düsseldorf and Munich. Former
world champion Efim Bogolyubov was a member of the club. Chairwoman
Barbara Hund took part in 15 Chess Olympiads and won a silver medal in
1978 in Buenos Aires.
The billiard club BSC Freiburg-Kaiserstuhl
played from 2004 to 2006 in the second pool billiard league and won the
German team cup in 2011. In 2015 he moved to Denzlingen and was renamed
PS Denzlingen.
The skate park in Dietenbachpark, which was
inaugurated in early 2015, was enlarged to 2400 square meters in 2020.
He received a replica of the "Arto Saari Bowl", a Californian swimming
pool. Since July 2020, there has also been Freiburg's first parkour
course nearby, in addition to a generation playground.
In June
2020, the first Freiburg pump track was opened in the Denzlinger Straße
green area in the Zähringen district.
You can boulder in three
halls in the southwest of Freiburg or outdoors at Wiehrebahnhof, under
the Kronenbrücke and on Augustinerweg.
Slacklining is a trend
sport that has a large community in Freiburg. The city has installed
wooden trunks in various parks to fasten the lines. In the March there
are two highlines over the Dreisam.
In addition, there are over
200 sports clubs in Freiburg that offer around 100 popular sports and
good training opportunities for them.
There are a total of nine swimming pools in Freiburg, three of which
are outdoor pools. They are operated by the municipal company Freiburger
Stadtbau GmbH or its subsidiary Regio Baeder GmbH.
The largest
bath in Freiburg is the Eugen-Keidel-Bad, a mineral thermal bath with a
large bathing and sauna area. It is connected to public transport via a
bus line, but the location in the forest far from the city gates is more
car-friendly. It is operated by Freiburger Stadtbau GmbH.
In the
west of Freiburg in the immediate vicinity of the Seepark is the
Westbad, which is primarily designed as a sports pool. It has a 50-meter
pool that can be divided by a movable partition, a non-swimmer pool and
a baby pool, as well as a five-meter-deep diving pool with a 10-meter
diving board. Outside there are sunbathing lawns, play areas, children's
pools and an outdoor swimming pool that has not been in operation for a
long time due to the city's financial difficulties. In addition to the
German Swimming Championships in 1979, the German Short Course
Championships took place there in 2000.
Near the city center is
the Faulerbad, which is designed as a leisure pool with a 25 m swimming
pool, a non-swimmer pool, a sunbathing area and a sauna.
In the
district of Haslach is the indoor garden pool in Haslach with several
pools, including a non-swimmer pool and a diving pool up to five meters
and a sunbathing area. There are other sports pools in Lehen with a 17 m
pool and in Hochdorf.
The largest of the outdoor pools is the
lido in the immediate vicinity of the Dreisam Stadium on the border of
the eastern districts of Waldsee and Ebnet. It has a non-swimmer pool
with a 91 m slide, a paddling pool and a 50 m pool as well as spacious
sunbathing areas, changing rooms and catering facilities. Bouncy castle
and beach volleyball courts complete the wide range. The pools are
heated by solar energy.
In the district of Wiehre is the
Lorettobad with a separate "women's pool", which is only accessible to
women and children.
The third outdoor pool is the St. Georgen
outdoor pool with a 25 m pool in connection with a non-swimmer area with
a wide slide. The sunbathing lawn is partly curved in hills and offers
an extensive sports area with a trampoline and playing fields, among
other things.
The outdoor pools are only open during the summer
season. The other six swimming pools are available all year round with
different breaks. The Opfinger See is approved for swimming. Lifeguards
ensure safety when the flag is raised.
In 2021, Freiburg applied to host a four-day program for an international delegation to the Special Olympics World Summer Games 2023 in Berlin. In 2022, the city was chosen to host Special Olympics Algeria. This makes the city part of the largest municipal inclusion project in the history of the Federal Republic with over 200 host towns.
January: International Culture Exchange Freiburg (since 1989)
Freiburg Borderless Festival (since 2002)
MUNDOlogia Festival (photo
festival, since 2004)
February: Automobile (New Car Fair, since 1986)
February/March: Folklorists describe the Freiburg Fasnet as a mixture of
the Swabian-Alemannic carnival and the Rhenish club carnival. The
driving force is the Breisgau fools' guild in Freiburg with its 35
member guilds.
March: Camping Freizeit Tourism mit bike aktiv and
holiday fair (consumer exhibition with a focus on leisure, since 1972)
March and April: Freiburg Marathon (since 2004)
Environmental
Convention Freiburg
April/May: Freiburg Gay Film Week (since 1985) at
the Kandelhof cinema
Freiburg Spring Fair (fair, fair, start: Friday
before the third Sunday in May)
Freiburg Film Forum ethnology (film
festival on ethnology, Africa, America, Asia, Oceania, every two years
since 1985)
Spring/Summer: Duck race on the Dreisam (since 2011,
pause in 2014)
June: Oberlindenhock in the old town of Freiburg –
annually on the last weekend in June (since 1969)
June: Pottery
market at Alter Wiehrebahnhof – annually on the last weekend in June
(since 1990)
June/July: Freiburg tunes in, music festival to join in
(since 2011)
Klong, Children's Music Festival (since 2010)
Christopher Street Day (since 2014)
June to August: Ebneter cultural
summer (since 2005)
June to September: Münstersummer (since 2000,
with weekly organ concert, museum night, frame drum festival and much
more)
Summer: Open-air cinema in the courtyard of the Black Monastery
(at least since 2003)
Schauinsland Classic (since 2001)
Nostalgic
fair on the Stühlinger church square (since 1995)
Summer festival
with flea market Habsburgerstraße (since 2011)
July: Sea of Love
Music Festival at Lake Tunisee (since 2001)
Freiburg Wine Festival
(since 2001)
Herdermer Hock (since 1979)
Tent Music Festival
(since 1983)
July/August: Rathaushofspiele by the Wallgraben-Theater
Seefest (folk festival in the Seepark area) (did not take place in 2007
and 2008 due to increased costs)
Frame drum festival Tamburi Mundi
Schlossberg Festival (with interruptions)
August: Freiburg wine
tasting (small wine festival in the inner courtyard of the historic
department store and in front of it)
August/September: Art in the
Upper Old Town (since 1979)
September: Baden-Messe (Freiburg's
largest consumer exhibition)
last Sunday in September: soap box race
on the Eichhalde
October: Freiburg Autumn Fair (fair, fair, start:
Friday before the third Sunday in October)
International Minerals and
Fossils Days Freiburg im Breisgau (since 1978, New Fair)
November:
Plaza Culinaria (Culinary Fair)
Brettlemarkt (fair for winter sports)
Freiburg toy and model railway exchange
Freiburg Literature Talk
(since 1986)
November/December: Freiburg Christmas market (since
1973)
Christmas Eve: Brass concert at the main cemetery (since 1927)
December/January: Christmas Circus Festival
In 2016, Freiburg im Breisgau, within the city limits, had a gross
domestic product (GDP) of €11.264 billion, ranking 35th in the ranking
of German cities by economic output. In the same year, GDP per capita
was €49,621 (Baden-Württemberg: €43,632, Germany €38,180) and is thus
well above the regional and national average. In 2016, the city's
economic output recorded nominal growth of 3.8%. In 2017 there were
around 172,600 employed people in the city. At the end of 2021, the
city’s total debt was around EUR 1.35 billion (EUR 5,880 per capita).
The unemployment rate was 4.7% in December 2018 and thus above the
average of 3.0% in Baden-Württemberg.
In the 2016 Atlas of the
Future, the independent city of Freiburg im Breisgau ranked 50th out of
402 rural districts and independent cities in Germany, making it one of
the places with "great prospects for the future". In the 2019 edition,
it was ranked 57 out of 401.
The city is located in the Freiburg agglomeration, which, in addition to the city of Freiburg, includes the municipalities of Au (Breisgau), Bötzingen, Gundelfingen, Kirchzarten, March, Merzhausen and Umkirch in the Breisgau-Hochschwarzwald district and the cities and municipalities of Emmendingen, Denzlingen and Waldkirch in the Emmendingen district includes. In addition to Offenburg, Freiburg forms a regional center for the southern Upper Rhine region, of which a total of 14 have been designated for all of Baden-Württemberg according to the 2002 state development plan. The regional center in Freiburg takes over for the communities of Au, Bötzingen, Buchenbach, Ebringen, Eichstetten am Kaiserstuhl, Glottertal, Gottenheim, Gundelfingen, Heuweiler, Horben, Kirchzarten, March, Merzhausen, Oberried, St. Märgen, St. Peter (Upper Black Forest), Schallstadt, Sölden, Stegen, Umkirch and Wittnau function as a central area.
Freiburg is a regional economic center. The service sector and the public service dominate. The city's largest employer is the university with the university hospital, followed by numerous state and subordinate authorities. Due to the proximity to the university, smaller companies from the fields of solar technology, information and media technology as well as medical technology and biotechnology have settled here.
Numerous trade and public fairs, especially for solar energy technology, make Freiburg an important regional trade fair location. This was taken into account in 2000 when the Freiburg Exhibition Center moved to a new site with a modern hall infrastructure. Another international trade fair is the INTERbrossa-BRUSHexpo, which is the world's leading trade fair for its industry every four years.
In addition, tourism plays a prominent role. The city is located on the Black Forest and is one of the most popular travel destinations in south-west Germany. The city is located on the Baden Wine Route and on the "Green Road - Route verte", a tourist road connection from the Vosges in Alsace to the Black Forest. In 2007, more than one million overnight stays were counted in the city for the first time, most recently in 2013 it was just over one million overnight stays again. With a ratio of 5,000 overnight stays per 1,000 inhabitants, Freiburg is one of the top tourist destinations. Since 2012, 18 pillars with a city map and information about the most important sights in the old town have been showing pedestrians the way. In the 16th edition of the Lonely Planets Best in Travel 2022 travel guide, Freiburg was ranked third in the top ten global city travel destinations behind Auckland and Taipei.
Around 43 percent of Freiburg's district is covered with forest of various types (Mooswald, Mittelwald and Bergwald), around a third of which is owned by the city, which is one of the largest municipal forest owners in Germany. The most important tree species, which are also used economically, are beech, English oak, spruce, fir and Douglas fir. In addition to economic use, the forest also has ecological significance and is an important part of recreational and leisure activities. One of the two forest departments of the state of Baden-Württemberg and the state's forest research institute located here bear witness to the importance of the forest for the city.
Viticulture also plays a not insignificant economic role in Freiburg. The city in the Breisgau wine-growing area borders on three other Baden areas: Markgräfler Land, Tuniberg and Kaiserstuhl with different typical grape varieties. With around 650 hectares of vineyards, Freiburg is the largest wine-growing city and one of the largest wine-growing communities in Germany - mainly due to the incorporation of several wine-growing communities in the west of the city in the 1970s. But even on small areas in the city center, wine is still cultivated, e.g. B. on the Freiburg Schlossberg. One of the wineries that grow there is the Stiftungsweingut Freiburg in Merzhausen. The importance of viticulture for the city is underscored by the State Viticulture Institute and the seat of the Baden Viticulture Association. The university has also been growing its own wine again since 1985, after this tradition had been interrupted since 1806. Before that, the salary of the professors depended directly on the yield of viticulture.
According to the 2007 municipal survey of the Baden-Württemberg
taxpayers' association, municipal tax revenues of 224 million euros in
2006 and estimated tax revenues for 2007 of 234 million euros are offset
by debts of 475 million euros. The debts are made up of 335 million
euros in debt from the treasury budget and 140 million euros in debt
from the city's own operations and special funds.
In the Freiburg
region with the urban district of Freiburg and the rural districts of
Breisgau-Hochschwarzwald and Emmendingen, there were around 230,000
employees in 1987, and in 2007 there were already around 302,000
employees. There were around 170,000 employees in Freiburg in 1987, and
around 201,000 in 2007.
In 2003, four wind turbines were built on the Roßkopf and two on the Holzschlägermatte on the Schauinsland. Freiburg is known for its sunny, warm climate, for research and production in the field of solar energy. The solar settlement on Schlierberg with 59 energy-plus houses is located in the district of Vauban. The importance of solar energy for the city and region is also reflected in the Intersolar trade fair, which is of great international importance for the relatively small Freiburg trade fair. This fair has been held in Munich since 2007, but continues to be co-organized from Freiburg. Freiburg has earned a reputation as the "sunny city" for its pioneering role in solar energy. In 2004, the city of Freiburg received the German Solar Prize from the European Association for Renewable Energies for its support of citizen engagement. (Eurosolar) in the category towns and communities or municipal utilities. In March 2014, Freiburg was awarded the title of "Energy Municipality".
Compared to other cities of a similar size, the share of car traffic in the total inner-city traffic volume in Freiburg is low. On the other hand, the proportion of bicycle traffic is very high, which favors the traffic turnaround. The length of the Freiburg road, cycle and footpath network is around 1290 kilometers. Of these, 191 kilometers are main roads (district, state and federal roads and main roads), 439 kilometers are secondary roads, 200 kilometers are independently managed cycle paths and footpaths, and 460 kilometers are service roads.
Freiburg is conveniently located on the large European transport
routes Rhine-Saône-Rhône-Mediterranean and Rhine-Gotthard-Italy. The A 5
motorway connects Freiburg to the north with Strasbourg, Karlsruhe,
Mannheim and Frankfurt am Main and to the south with Mulhouse (Mulhouse)
and Basel. Freiburg has three motorway exits: Nord, Mitte and Süd.
Freiburg is also on the B 3 federal highway (Buxtehude-Weil am Rhein)
and is crossed by the B 31 (Breisach-Lindau). The B 294 starts in
Freiburg and leads to Bretten via Freudenstadt and Pforzheim.
Freiburg is on a tourist route. This is the cross-border Green
Road/Route Verte, which begins west of the Vosges in Contrexéville,
crosses the Rhine at Breisach am Rhein and ends in Lindau in the
northern route and in Konstanz in the southern route.
In the
1960s, the Federal Motorway 86 was planned via Freiburg and
Donaueschingen. The "Black Forest autobahn" A 86 should be led from the
current A 5 exit Freiburg-Nord past the northern outskirts through
several tunnels into the Black Forest. However, the project was shelved
again in 1975. This makes the B 31 one of the most important east-west
connections in Baden-Württemberg, with all through traffic having to go
through the city. A tunnel under the city is being planned. The B 31 is
to be upgraded to a motorway with the designation A 860 in this course.
A start of construction is currently not foreseeable.
In the
1970s, Freiburg was one of the first cities to create a pedestrian zone
by blocking the city center for motor vehicle traffic. Today, the city
has a dynamic parking guidance system that indicates the number of free
parking spaces available in the numerous parking garages on the
outskirts of the car-free inner city. Since June 10, 2021, the fee can
also be paid by cell phone in the 9,000 parking spaces managed by the
city. The Quartier Vauban is designed as a largely car-free new housing
estate.
MeinFernbus opened Freiburg – Friedrichshafen – Munich in
April 2012 as the first domestic German long-distance bus route. Since
2013 there have been numerous connections, e.g. to Stuttgart,
Düsseldorf, Frankfurt am Main, Berlin and Prague and to the Balkans,
among others. by Flixbus and Eurolines.
In 2016, cycling accounted for around 34 percent of the total volume
of traffic in Freiburg, which is very high compared to other cities of a
similar size. The promotion of cycling has high priority for Freiburg's
transport policy, and since the bicycle has experienced a renaissance as
a means of transport in everyday life, Freiburg's transport policy is
considered exemplary in many places. The city has twice received the
Bicycle-Friendly Municipality award. In 2020, the ADFC determined the
satisfaction of cyclists in a non-representative survey, with Freiburg
coming in third after Karlsruhe and Münster and thus always in the top
three for ten years. A recurring problem is the lack of parking spaces
in the city center. In autumn 2020 there were 17 bicycle streets in
Freiburg, eight more were planned. There have long been two priority
cycling routes: the Dreisamuferradweg FR 1, which runs along the Dreisam
in an east-west direction for ten kilometers, and the freight train
cycle route FR 2, which crosses Freiburg in a north-south direction.
Cycle superhighways are planned, for example RS 6 Freiburg - Denzlingen
- Waldkirch/Emmendingen.
On May 17, 2019, Freiburger Verkehrs AG
launched the Frelo bicycle rental system. 615 bicycles (as of October
2021) are available for hire at over 74 stations spread across the city.
The system is supplied by Nextbike. Since March 2018, there have already
been 50 rental bikes from a private provider in the city area.
On
November 14, 2022, the construction of a 300-meter-long covered cycle
path with integrated solar cells began in Freiburg. The model project by
Badenova, Fraunhofer Institute for Solar Energy Systems (ISE) and the
city of Freiburg near the Europa Park Stadium and the Freiburg Trade
Fair is the first such project in Germany and Europe. It is scheduled to
be completed by the end of 2022. The covered cycle path protects
cyclists from precipitation while generating renewable electricity.
Until September 2020, traffic with e-scooters in Freiburg did not play a major role. Although cities with 100,000 or more inhabitants are generally interesting for rental companies, no provider has been established here to date. After the city decided on guidelines for scooter providers, it now wants to draw up specifications for a voluntary agreement that the scooter operators should then conclude with the city. In December, the Goettingen provider Yoio provided 150 vehicles that can be booked via smartphone. There are no fixed locations. Since July 2021, Süwag has been offering 50 e-scooters in the city area, which can be rented via app.
Freiburg Central Station is located on four railway lines and is used
by around 65,000 people every day. The Oberrheinbahn (Mannheim–Basel),
with connections e.g. to Zurich, Bern and Milan is currently being
expanded to four tracks, as it is to serve as a feeder to the New Rail
Link through the Alps (NRLA) in the direction of the Gotthard Base
Tunnel. There is a high-speed connection (TGV Est) in Strasbourg to
Paris via Offenburg-Kehl. There are also good intercity connections via
Karlsruhe to Stuttgart and Munich. Since August 2013, Freiburg has had a
direct high-speed connection via Müllheim-Neuchâtel via the Mulhouse TGV
train station in the direction of Paris, Lyon and Marseille, and later
also to Barcelona. The Höllentalbahn runs from Freiburg via the Black
Forest to Donaueschingen with connections to Munich and Konstanz.
In addition to the regional trains of DB Regio AG, the SWEG connects
the surrounding towns and communities with the regional center of
Freiburg: the Elztalbahn runs via Waldkirch through the Elztal to
Elzach, and the Breisacher Bahn runs to Breisach via Gottenheim and
Ihringen; in Gottenheim and Breisach there is a connection to the SWEG
Kaiserstuhlbahn, which circles the Kaiserstuhl. This company also
operates the Münstertalbahn between Bad Krozingen and Münstertal in the
surrounding area, with individual courses being run from and to
Freiburg.
In addition to the main station, there are other
stations or stops on the individual railway lines:
on the Upper Rhine
Railway: St. Georgen, Herdern and Zähringen
at the Höllentalbahn:
Wiehre and Littenweiler
on the Breisacher Bahn: Clinic, New
Exhibition Center/University and Freiburg-West (in the Landwasser
district)
In rail freight traffic, Freiburg is no longer a
railway hub; however, the Freiburg freight station serves as a terminal
for the rolling road from Freiburg to Novara in northern Italy.
Five tram lines and 20 bus lines operated by Freiburger Verkehrs AG
(VAG) serve local transport, which also provides connections to the
surrounding area. Freiburg belongs to the tariff area of the transport
association RVF.
Waggonfabrik Duewag designed three GT8 series
especially for VAG. The GT8K and GT8N are still in use today. The latter
have a low-floor middle compartment. The vehicle fleet also includes 26
GT8Zs from the same manufacturer with a 48 percent low-floor proportion.
After all, the busiest routes are operated by “Siemens Combino”
railcars, eight of which are “Combino Basic” and ten “Combino Advanced”,
and since 2015 the new Urbos from the Spanish company CAF, type Urbos
100, each with four bogies.
VAG also operates the
Schauinslandbahn, Germany's longest (3.6 kilometers) gondola cable car,
with which the heights of the Schauinsland, Freiburg's local mountain
(1284 m), can be easily reached.
In December 2017, the women's
night taxi was reintroduced, which had previously existed from 1991 to
2002.
The airfield in Freiburg, which has existed since 1908, is approved
as a commercial landing field for aircraft up to ten tons. It is located
in the west of the city, near the new exhibition center.
However,
most air traffic is handled via the EuroAirport Basel-Mulhouse-Freiburg
in neighboring Upper Alsace. There is a bus connection from Freiburg
main station to EuroAirport with a journey time of 55 minutes. There are
also shuttle buses to the nearby airports of Karlsruhe/Baden-Baden
(approx. 1:05 h) and Strasbourg (approx. 1:05 h). There are direct train
connections to Frankfurt Airport (approx. 2 hours 10 minutes) and to
Zurich Airport with a change in Basel or Zurich. (about 2:15 h)
History
Around 1120, water was supplied to the city via wooden pipes from the Mösle. In 1462 the rules for the city's gutters and canals were laid down in a Runzordnung. In 1732 there were already 79 pipes and 57 wells. The first iron lines have been used since 1842. Freiburg is supplied by the Ebnet waterworks (since 1876) and the Hausen an der Möhlin waterworks (since 1970). The water is pumped from Ebnet to the elevated tanks on the Schlossberg and the elevated tanks in the Freiburg Wasserschlössle am Sternwald (since 1896) and from Hausen to the elevated tanks on the Schönberg. There are other small elevated tanks on other high points in the city. Polyethylene pipes have been used to transport water since 1975. The water supply is provided by badenova AG & Co.KG.
Water is obtained in the two catchment areas of Ebnet and Hausen. In Ebnet, groundwater is extracted from two groundwater collectors and a total of nine deep wells. There are six deep wells in Hausen. The maximum depth of the well is 117 m. Eleven elevated tanks with 120 to 20,000 cubic meters are available. The water from Hausen is used without further treatment. The water has medium hardness, with 2.28 mmol/L, contains 9.9 mg sodium, 25 mg chloride, 24.7 mg sulfite and 25.7 mg nitrate per liter. The catchment area covers 130 square kilometers and supplies around five million cubic meters. The water from Ebnet is treated for neutralization and sterilization. The water has the hardness range soft, with 0.99 mmol/L, contains 8.5 mg sodium, 13.1 mg chloride, 10.7 mg sulfite and 13.6 mg nitrate per liter. The catchment area covers approximately 258 square kilometers and supplies approximately 11 million cubic meters.
In 2008, a total of 17.7 million cubic meters of water were used. The maximum production was 65,800 cubic meters per day. The supply network, including house connections, has a length of 1,325 kilometers and comprises 35,236 house connections. With the introduction of water meters in 1913, consumption fell from 348 liters per day and inhabitant in 1899 to 186 liters. Today it is around 100 liters/day and inhabitant. From the 13th century, the Freiburg Bächle and the commercial canal were used to dispose of service water and rainwater. In addition, in-house pits were used to collect the excrement. From 1868, for a short time, a company took over the emptying of the pits instead of farmers. From 1887 the city took over this task. Up to the end of the 1980s, waste water was discharged in the sewage treatment plant. The wastewater treatment association Breisgauer Bucht has been collecting and cleaning the wastewater since 1966. Since 1980 this has been done in the joint sewage treatment plant in Forchheim.
The district heating network in Freiburg resembles a structure
consisting of several islands. From 2019, Freiburg drew up a concept
that is intended to represent long-term district heating planning and
was approved by the municipal council in 2021. The individual islands
are to be connected to form a uniform network. In particular, planning
security should be created for the property owners by showing which
urban areas should be supplied with district heating connections in the
long term. The basic structure is initially a connection between the
district heating networks of the districts of Haslach, Vauban and
Stühlinger. The central building block is the Schwarzwaldmilch dairy,
which produces waste heat close to the city centre. For the western
districts, an extension of the previously existing district heating
network from the industrial area north to Landwasser to the new district
of Dietenbach is to connect the districts in between. The expansion
capacity is to increase from around one kilometer per year to 8-12
kilometers. The construction sites will probably lead to impairments in
road traffic for years to come. Furthermore, new development areas such
as Kleineschholz or the expansion of the Metzgergrün area in Stühlinger
are to be equipped with district heating connections from the start.
The path taken by Freiburg is viewed nationwide as an example of
municipal heat planning.
The larger private employers include the semiconductor manufacturer
TDK-Micronas, LITEF GmbH, which belongs to the American Northrop Grumman
group, and Cerdia, a company owned by the US financial investor
Blackstone, which produces materials for cigarette filters. The company
EFD Induction, from 1950 to 1996 Fritz Düsseldorf GmbH (FDF), is
Europe's largest manufacturer of induction hardening systems and,
together with EFD Härterei F. Düsseldorf GmbH (Hochdorf), belongs to the
EFD Induction Group based in Skien/Norway . The building materials
dealer Götz + Moriz is based in Freiburg. The largest local brewery is
the Ganter brewery. The milk processing company Schwarzwaldmilch, which
is majority owned by the Black Forest and Breisgau dairy farmers, is
important. Since January 1996, Freiburg has been the seat of Deutsche
Post AG's letter center 79.
Since 1962, Freiburg has been the
site of the drug manufacturer Gödecke, which now belongs to the Pfizer
Group. The Raimann company was founded in 1863 to manufacture machines
for woodworking. It now belongs to Michael Weinig AG and is the oldest
industrial company in Freiburg. The two companies Mez and Madeira
Garnfabrik have been active in the textile industry since the beginning
of the 20th century.
Zapf Umzüge GmbH, one of the leading
European moving companies, has been based in Freiburg since 1984. It was
founded in West Berlin in 1975 as an alternative company.
Hellige, a manufacturer of scientific and medical electronic equipment,
in particular electrocardiographs, has been based in Freiburg since
1895. Today, Hellige belongs to General Electric, with Freiburg being
one of the most important locations of GE Healthcare in Germany.
With the two major publishers Herder and Haufe, a large number of
smaller publishers and the headquarters of the Badische Zeitung,
Freiburg is an important publishing and media location.
Solar-Fabrik AG Freiburg was one of the leading solar companies in
Europe until it went bankrupt. Originally only a manufacturer of solar
modules, it was active with its numerous international subsidiaries all
over the world in all areas of photovoltaics: trading and processing of
wafers, production of solar cells and modules as well as the production
of solar power plants.
The IT sector is also prominently
represented in Freiburg. These include the German market leader in the
field of "commercial software" Lexware, United Planet as a leading
company in portal software and the managed services subsidiary of IDS
Scheer Consulting. The Paragon Software Group, Jedox AG, the eCommerce
specialist Oxid, the e-mail marketing expert Inxmail and the listed
Kofax Deutschland AG, a subsidiary of the Californian company Kofax,
Inc., are also based in Freiburg. The international CMS provider Jahia
Solutions Group SA chose Freiburg as the location for its German office
in 2016.
In the banking sector, in addition to the Sparkasse
Freiburg-Nördlicher Breisgau and the Volksbank Freiburg eG, the Bankhaus
E. Mayer AG has its headquarters in Freiburg. The latter is the only
private bank in Freiburg and the wider area. There are also branches of
other national banks.
Germany's largest forest consulting
company, UNIQUE forestry and land use GmbH, has its headquarters in
Freiburg.
Since January 2011, the city administration of Freiburg has been
divided into five departments, each of which is responsible for a number
of city offices. Department I is headed by Lord Mayor Martin Horn
(independent) and is responsible for the main and personnel
administration and for organisation, law, regional affairs and public
relations. Department II is headed by Mayor Christine Buchheit (Greens)
and is the Department for the Environment, Schools and Education.
Department III, headed by Mayor Ulrich von Kirchbach (SPD), is
responsible for culture, youth and social affairs and integration. He is
the first mayor and deputy mayor at the same time. Stefan Breiter (CDU)
succeeded Otto Neideck on April 1, 2018, who headed Department IV for
finance, economics and housing, central IT, public order, citizen
service, fire brigade and sports. The newly formed Department V is
headed by the independent Martin Haag and includes the areas of urban
development and construction, civil engineering with traffic planning,
urban greenery and building management.
Although the
Breisgau-Hochschwarzwald district office is based in the independent
city of Freiburg, it essentially only administers the district
surrounding the city. However, the responsibility of some offices in the
district (in particular the health department, supply office) also
extends to the urban district of Freiburg.
There are several state authorities in Freiburg, such as the Freiburg
Regional Council with the President's seat in the Basler Hof, which also
includes new departments including the Police Headquarters, School
Authority, Forest Directorate and the State Office for Geology, Raw
Materials and Mining.
Furthermore, the "Forestry and Research
Institute of Baden-Württemberg", the "State Viticulture Institute", the
"Chemical and Veterinary Examination Office Freiburg" and the two tax
offices of Freiburg-Stadt and Freiburg-Land are located in Freiburg.
The Freiburg prison is used for the execution of prison sentences
from 15 months to life imprisonment as well as preventive detention for
the whole of Baden-Württemberg.
Since 1806, the Freiburg State
Archive has been storing the written documentation of the state
authorities in the area of the administrative district of Freiburg. It
has been a department of the State Archives of Baden-Württemberg since
2005.
In addition to the state authorities, there are also federal authorities in Freiburg. These include departments of the Federal Employment Agency, the Federal Office for Radiation Protection (with measuring point on the Schauinsland), the Technical Relief Agency, the Federal Agency for Real Estate Tasks, the Procurement Office of the Federal Customs Administration and the Federal Network Agency as well as the Federal Archives-Military Archives, the Upper Rhine Waterways and Shipping Office and the center for Medical-Meteorological Research Freiburg (ZMMF) of the German Weather Service. There is also a mobile control and surveillance unit of the Federal Police Office in Weil am Rhein, which reports to the Federal Police Headquarters South (Munich), as well as Bundeswehr offices. The branch of the Deutsche Bundesbank is located on the edge of the old town in Neuburg.
Other organizations in the legal form of a corporation under public
law are based in Freiburg:
Regional Association Southern Upper Rhine
K. d. O.R.
Chamber of Crafts Freiburg K. d. O.R.
IHK Südlicher
Oberrhein K. d. O.R.
Bar Association Freiburg K. d. O.R.
Chamber
of Tax Advisors South Baden K. d. O.R.
Medical Association Freiburg,
a branch of the Medical Association Baden-Württemberg based in Stuttgart
Dental Association Freiburg, a branch of the Dental Association
Baden-Württemberg based in Stuttgart
Freiburg has a district court and a regional court, which belong to
the higher regional court district of the higher regional court in
Karlsruhe. Some civil senates of the Karlsruhe Higher Regional Court
also have their seat in Freiburg.
In addition to the courts of
ordinary jurisdiction, there is a labor court in Freiburg (and a chamber
of the state labor court), external senates of the Baden-Württemberg
Finance Court, a social court (responsible for the urban district of
Freiburg, the districts of Breisgau-Hochschwarzwald, Ortenaukreis,
Emmendingen, Lörrach and Waldshut as well as in miner's rights matters
for the entire state of Baden-Württemberg) and an administrative court
(responsible for the administrative district of Freiburg).
The city's emergency rescue service is provided by the German Red Cross and the Malteser Hilfsdienst. The DRK operates the integrated control center together with the city of Freiburg and the district of Breisgau-Hochschwarzwald in the Office for Fire Protection and Disaster Prevention. The control center is responsible for an area of 1531 square kilometers in which almost 500,000 people live. According to the DRK count in January 2019, the integrated control center receives around 109,000 emergency calls, 121,000 requests for patient transport and around 41,000 calls for the emergency medical service. Every year, the control center manages 7,000 calls by the fire brigade and rescue services as well as 44,000 pure rescue service calls. Freiburg has rescue station 1 (Freiburg-Betzenhausen) and rescue station 2 not far from the main train station. The DRK operates the rescue service's three emergency doctor vehicles, two of which are stationed at St. Josef's Hospital and another at the emergency center of the University Hospital in Freiburg. A DRF helicopter is stationed at Freiburg Airport; In addition to intensive care transports, it is also used in emergency rescue at the request of the Freiburg control center.
There is only one regional daily newspaper in Freiburg, the Badische
Zeitung, whose circulation area stretches from Offenburg in the north to
the High Rhine in the south and into the Upper Black Forest. It is
published Monday to Saturday excluding public holidays. On Sunday comes
Der Sonntag free of charge from the same publishing house, which is
distributed to households, so that the Badischer Verlag has a monopoly
on the daily newspapers as the publisher.
In addition, since
November 1988 there has been the official gazette of the city of
Freiburg (title until 2002: StadtNachrichten), in which editorial
articles, city dates and opening times, announcements and job
advertisements from the city of Freiburg as well as articles by the
factions and groups represented in the municipal council are printed.
Editorially, the Official Journal is limited to topics that are directly
related to the city administration. Since the beginning of 2023, the
Official Journal has been published on Saturdays and is distributed free
of charge to all Freiburg households every 14 days as a supplement to
the weekly newspaper "Der Sonntag" with a circulation of 111,000 copies.
The “Freiburger Wochenbericht”, the oldest German advertising paper
still in existence, is published every Wednesday with a circulation of
107,500 copies (as of May 2016). It is distributed free of charge to all
households and also contains editorial articles. The free "Freiburger
Stadtkurier" from the Freiburg publishing house of the same name has
been published in a similar format since 1983. He was hired at the end
of 2022.
In addition to these four larger newspapers, there are a
few other smaller newspapers and magazines from and for Freiburg, such
as district newspapers or the citizens' newspapers of local local
associations.
The “Zypresse”, which appears free of charge on
Wednesdays and Saturdays, is an offer sheet for private and business
classifieds. It was founded in 1984 and has a circulation of 50,000
(Wednesdays) and 60,000 (Saturdays, Freiburg only) copies (as of May
2016). Additional regional editions are published on Saturdays in the
Lörrach/Basel area and in the greater Offenburg/Lahr area. The cypress
is in competition with the “schnapp.de” offer sheet from the Badische
Zeitung, which appears every Thursday and is cross-media in nature –
i.e. closely linked to the online presence.
In addition to these
advertising papers, there are other culture and event magazines that
appear monthly. This includes the two city magazines "Fipps-Freiburg"
and "Kultur Joker" as well as the two culture magazines "Freiburg
aktuell" (until the end of 2018) and "Chilli - das Freiburger
stadtmagazin". The range of culture and event magazines is supplemented
by the “bz-ticket.de” supplement that appears in the Badische Zeitung
every Friday. Alternatively, there has also been a street newspaper
since 1998, the "FREIeBÜRGER". This newspaper is sold monthly by mostly
socially disadvantaged people in the streets of Freiburg.
In Freiburg there is a broadcasting house of the public
Südwestrundfunk, the SWR-Studio Freiburg, in which, among other things,
programs for SWR4 Baden-Württemberg and SWR television are produced.
Furthermore, the SWR Symphony Orchestra Baden-Baden and Freiburg was
based in the Konzerthaus Freiburg until 2016, now the SWR Symphony
Orchestra gives concerts there.
As a private broadcaster,
regional radio baden.fm is financed by advertising. The third Freiburg
radio station, Radio Dreyeckland, which is produced near the city center
and emerged from the anti-nuclear movement, is the oldest free radio
station in Germany. Since 2006 there has also been a terrestrial
broadcaster, uniFM. This transmitter is the learning and training radio
of the teacher training college and the university.
In addition
to these media, which are specially focused on Freiburg, there is also
Radio Regenbogen for the entire Baden region.
In the district of
Lehen, the SWR operates a transmission system for medium wave (frequency
828 kHz, transmission power 10 kW, geographic coordinates of the
transmitter location: ♁48° 0′ 48″ N, 7° 47′ 38″ E) and FM radio, which
serve as an antenna carrier 92 meter high steel lattice mast with a
square cross-section, isolated from ground. The transmitter site in
Freiburg-Lehen is one of the oldest in Germany.
On April 22, 2020, the city started a new digital and free city network #freiburgkeepstogether. It is part of the city's digitization strategy and, according to plans by the social department, is intended to strengthen neighborly and civic engagement. In addition to the options for swapping, lending, selling, offering, and advising, the platform also has a chat function. A moderation team monitors netiquette. The basis of the platform is the research project "Social Neighborhood and Technology" (SoNaTe), in which the city is involved as an application partner. This has been funded by the Federal Ministry of Education and Research (BMBF) with over five million euros since 2015 as part of the "Innovations for municipalities and regions in demographic change" funding initiative.
A wide range of schools in Freiburg can meet a wide range of training
requirements.
The basic offer is made up of 40 elementary and
secondary schools, some of which are privately owned, which are spread
across the city. At secondary schools there are eight Realschulen, two
of which are private, eleven general schools of various types, some of
which are independently run (e.g. the Free Christian School Freiburg and
the democratic school Kapriole), and since 1972 the German-French
Gymnasium, one from two such schools in Germany with a dual national
qualification. Since 2010, the Goethe-Gymnasium Freiburg has offered a
student engineer academy. There are a total of five comprehensive
schools, one of which is the public Staudinger comprehensive school and
the other four are based on Waldorf education. The UWC Robert Bosch
College in Freiburg is the only United World College in Germany. It is a
boarding school for 16 to 19 year olds from over 70 nations.
In
addition, four vocational high schools and ten vocational schools for
the commercial and industrial sector are located in the city.
Finally, there are ten special education and counseling centers in the
city, four with a focus on learning, four with a focus on intellectual
development, one private each with a focus on social-emotional
development and one with a focus on language.
The private Jazz &
Rock Schools Freiburg, founded in 1984, offer training as a professional
musician in the music styles jazz, rock and pop at the International
Music College Freiburg. The Freiburg Music School offers music lessons
for children and adults, and the Center for Music Education offers
further training in cooperation with the Baden-Württemberg Pop Academy.
In addition, the wide range of educational opportunities is
supplemented by a number of other private schools, for example in the
areas of elementary education, family care, graphics/design. There is
also the Freiburg drama school in the E-Werk.
In the field of
adult education and further education, the adult education center in
Freiburg and the Catholic Educational Institute offer a wide range of
further education opportunities. Several language schools complete this
offer, including the Goethe-Institut.
There are several universities in Freiburg with a total of over
30,000 students. The Albert Ludwig University, founded in 1457, is one
of the oldest and most renowned universities in Germany with over 24,000
students. It has a lasting influence on life in the city: there are many
well-frequented cafés and pubs around the university. With almost 20,000
jobs (including the clinic), the university is one of the most important
employers in southern Baden.
The Freiburg University of Education
(PH) in the Littenweiler district was formed in 1962 from the former
academies for teacher training I and II and has had the status of a
scientific university since 1971.
The Freiburg University of
Music is located in the district of Oberau. It was founded by the city
of Freiburg in 1946 and later continued as a state university by the
state of Baden-Württemberg.
In addition to the state universities
mentioned, there are other higher education institutions:
The
"Evangelical University of Freiburg - University of Social Work,
Diaconia and Religious Education" and the "Catholic University of
Freiburg - University of Social Sciences, Curative Education, Religious
Education and Nursing" are universities of applied sciences run by the
church.
The "Free University for Graphic Design & Fine Arts", which
merged with the Freiburg Graphic School in 2007, trains students in the
three courses of study Graphic Design, Screen/Web Design and Fine Arts.
In the fall of 2011, studies will begin at the University of Art, Design
and Popular Music, which merged the Free University for Graphic Design
and Fine Arts with the International Music College Freiburg, a division
of the Freiburg Jazz & Rock Schools.
The private International
University of Cooperative Education offers courses in hotel management,
real estate management and sports management in a dual system
(alternating studies and practice).
The FOM Hochschule offers
bachelor's and master's courses in addition to training and work.
Freiburg is one of the study locations of the university, which has been
based in Essen since 1993.
The teacher training course at the state
universities is supplemented by training at the seminars for didactics
and teacher training, one each for vocational schools, for grammar
schools and for secondary schools.
Macromedia University, University
of Applied Sciences, Freiburg site.
There are several research institutes in Freiburg:
Institutes of
the Max Planck Society (MPI):
MPI for Immunobiology and Epigenetics
MPI for the Study of Crime, Safety and Law
Working group Fire Ecology
Freiburg of the Max Planck Institute for Chemistry Mainz, which operates
the Global Fire Monitoring Center (GFMC), a center commissioned by the
United Nations to monitor and evaluate large forest and steppe fires
The city of Freiburg is still a "corporate supporting member" of the
Max Planck Society.
Institutes of the Fraunhofer Society:
Fraunhofer Institute for Applied Solid State Physics (IAF)
Fraunhofer
Institute for High-Speed Dynamics – Ernst Mach Institute (EMI)
Fraunhofer Institute for Physical Measurement Techniques (IPM)
Fraunhofer Institute for Solar Energy Systems (ISE)
Fraunhofer
Institute for Mechanics of Materials (IWM)
Other research
institutions:
Institute for Microsystems Technology - University
research institute in the field of micro and nanotechnology
Kiepenheuer Institute for Solar Physics - operates solar observatories
on the Schauinsland and Observatorio del Teide
Öko-Institut, a
non-profit private environmental research institute
Walter Eucken
Institute, a social and economic research institute founded in 1954 in
the vicinity of the Albert Ludwig University
Institute for Frontier
Areas of Psychology and Mental Health - dedicated to research into
parapsychological phenomena
Freiburg Science Forum - promotes
innovation and university-based business start-ups.
Arnold
Bergstraesser Institute – deals with cultural studies and development
policy issues
Alemannisches Institut Freiburg – promotes
interdisciplinary and cross-border cultural research into the
Alemannic-Swabian language and settlement area
The German Folksong
Archive, founded in 1914, was merged into the University's Center for
Popular Culture and Music in 2014. It deals with the collection,
research and edition of popular and traditional songs from
German-speaking countries.
Johannes Künzig Institute for East German
Folklore (JKI) - researches the folklore of those displaced from their
homeland. Since 1964 it has been subordinate to the Ministry of the
Interior of Baden-Württemberg.
Corpus Vitrearum Medii Aevi (CVMA), an
art historical research institute for medieval stained glass
According to crime statistics, Freiburg was the city in Baden-Württemberg with the highest crime rate for 16 years. In 2017 there were 11,712 crimes per 100,000 inhabitants. For a long time, little attention was paid to this value. An impact on the feeling of security of the population only occurred after four violent deaths within a few months, starting in autumn 2016, received public attention throughout Europe, such as the murder of Maria Ladenburger. Two years later, a gang rape in the city received similar national attention. As a result, a security partnership was established between the city and the police. Since December 2016, 25 riot police have been supporting the Freiburg colleagues. The city has also set up a ten-strong city police force to deal with administrative offences. In 2019, Freiburg was behind Baden-Baden and Mannheim in the crime statistics. The police clearance rate was also above the national average.
The city of Freiburg awards honorary citizenship to people who have made a special contribution to the reputation of the city or the well-being of its citizens. Freiburg's honorary citizens range from the rococo sculptor Johann Christian Wentzinger to the former mayor Rolf Böhme and the patron Eugen Martin in the present.
Important personalities were born in Freiburg. Some moved away and later found their sphere of activity elsewhere and only became known there. There are artists like Johann Christian Wentzinger, Julius Bissier, Rosemarie Bühler-Fey, Manolo Lohnes or Edith Picht-Axenfeld, politicians like Karl von Rotteck, Joseph Wirth, Leo Wohleb, Hans Maier or Wolfgang Schäuble, scientists like Carl Christian Mez or Karl Rahner , inventors like Edwin Welte or Engelbert Zaschka and actors like Til Schweiger.
Many personalities are associated with Freiburg, who either lived here for a while or found their sphere of activity here and became well-known. These include philosophers like Edmund Husserl and Martin Heidegger, scientists like Walter Eucken and Arnold Bergstraesser, writers like Alfred Döblin and Christoph Meckel, artists like Hans Baldung Grien, actresses like Alexandra Maria Lara, Nobel Prize winners like Georges Köhler and Hermann Staudinger, saints like Edith Stein , football coach like Joachim Löw.
On the first day of issue on July 2, 2020, Deutsche Post AG issued a
special postage stamp with a nominal value of 80 cents to mark the 900th
anniversary of the city. The design came from the graphic designers
Daniela Haufe and Detlef Fiedler from Berlin.
In addition, the
minster was on a value of the definitive stamp series Sights.
As
early as 1970, Freiburg was featured in the tourism series.
On the occasion of the 900th anniversary, the Mint of Germany of the Federal Administration Office issued a 20-euro collector's coin in sterling silver on July 9, 2020. The design comes from Bastian Prillwitz.