Park am Gleisdreieck – Ostpark, Berlin

Park am Gleisdreieck – Ostpark gives you open lawns and traces of a vanished railway landscape in the heart of the city. This eastern section covers 17 hectares and opened on 2 September 2011. Its broad paths, long wooden benches and spacious Kreuzberger Wiese create an unusually generous setting for recreation, while play areas, sports spaces and a rose-scent garden bring smaller experiences into the wide landscape.

The park occupies former freight-yard ground that remained closed to the public for roughly 40 years. That long interval allowed a dense, self-sown habitat to develop among old rails, signal remnants, inspection pits and pools. The planners call these thickets the Gleiswildnis, and gravel strips beside the railway provide habitat for beetles and lizards.

Listen for the railway line running through the park: it still serves the museum railway of the German Museum of Technology. The park’s design comes from Atelier Loidl, whose proposal won a two-stage landscape competition. Local residents helped shape the project, including a nature playground built with sand, stones, timber, mud, blackberry shrubs and apple trees instead of standard equipment. What you see here is both a recreation ground and a preserved fragment of railway wilderness.