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Ruhr Metropolitan Region Metropolregion Ruhr
map of the Ruhr metropolitan region within Germany
Country	Germany
State	North Rhine-Westphalia
Largest Cities	Dortmund Essen Duisburg Bochum
Government
• Body	Regionalverband Ruhr
Area
• Metro	4,435 km2 (1,712 sq mi)
Highest elevation	441 m (1,447 ft)
Lowest elevation	13 m (43 ft)
Population
• Metro	5,172,745
• Metro density	1,646/km2 (4,260/sq mi)
Time zone	CET (UTC+1)
GRP	2007
Nominal	€ 136.3 billion[1]
Website	www.metropoleruhr.de

The Ruhr (German Ruhrgebiet, colloquial Ruhrpott, Kohlenpott, Pott or Revier), is an urban area in North Rhine-Westphalia, Germany.^[2] With a population density of 7100/km² and a population of some 7.3 million,^[3] it is the largest urban agglomeration in Germany. It consists of several large, formerly industrial cities bordered by the rivers Ruhr to the south, Rhine to the west, and Lippe to the north. In the Southwest it borders to the Bergisches Land. It is considered part of the larger Rhine-Ruhr metropolitan region of more than 12 million people.

Since the Ruhr is polycentric, coordinates shown are general in nature and so can be used to focus on the entire region of the Ruhr: 51°30′N 7°30′E / 51.5°N 7.5°E / 51.5; 7.5.

From west to east, the region includes the cities of Duisburg, Oberhausen, Bottrop, Mülheim an der Ruhr, Essen, Gelsenkirchen, Bochum, Herne, Hagen, Dortmund, and Hamm, as well as parts of the more "rural" districts Wesel, Recklinghausen, Unna and Ennepe-Ruhr-Kreis. Historically, the western Ruhr towns, such as Duisburg and Essen, belonged to the historic region of the Rhineland, whereas the eastern part of the Ruhr, including Gelsenkirchen, Bochum, Dortmund and Hamm, were part of the region of Westphalia. Since the 19th century, these districts have grown together into a large complex with a vast industrial landscape, inhabited by some 7.3 million people (when including Düsseldorf and Wuppertal). It is the fifth largest urban area in Europe after Istanbul, Moscow, London and Paris.

For 2010, the Ruhr region was one of the European Capitals of Culture.

Geography[link]

Map of the Ruhr

The urban landscape of the Ruhr extends from the Lower Rhine Basin east on to the Westphalian Plain and south on to the hills of the Rhenish Massif. Through the centre of the Ruhr runs a segment of the loess belt that extends across Germany from west to east. Historically, this loess belt has underlain some of Germany's richest agricultural regions.

Geologically, the region is defined by the occurrence of coal-bearing layers from the upper Carboniferous period, more or less independent of their depth. The coal seams reach the surface in a strip along the River Ruhr and dip downward from the river to the north. Beneath the River Lippe, the coal seams lie at a depth of 600 to 800 metres (2,000 to 2,600 feet). The thickness of the coal layers ranges from one to three metres (three to ten feet). This geological feature played a decisive role in the development of coal mining in the Ruhr.

According to the Regionalverband Ruhr (RVR, Ruhr Regional Association), 37.6% of the region’s area is built up. A total of 40.7% of the region’s land remains in agricultural use. Forests account for 17.6% of the region’s area. Bodies of water and other types of land use occupy the rest of the Ruhr's land. The inclusion of four mainly rural districts in the otherwise mainly industrial Ruhr helps to explain the large proportion of agricultural and forested land. In addition, the city boroughs of the Ruhr region have outlying districts with a rural character.

Seen on a map, the Ruhr could be considered a single city, since—at least in the north-south dimension—there are no visible breaks between the individual city boroughs. For this reason, the Ruhr is described as a polycentric urban area. The area is characterized by a similar history of urban and economic development.

Because of its history, the Ruhr is structured differently from monocentric urban regions such as Berlin and London, which developed through the rapid merger of smaller towns and villages with a growing central city. Instead, the individual city boroughs and urban districts of the Ruhr grew independently of one another during the Industrial Revolution. While large European cities typically have population densities of up to 20,000 inhabitants per square kilometre (about 50,000 per square mile), the population density of the central Ruhr—with only about 2,100 inhabitants per square kilometre (about 5,400 per square mile)—is thin compared to other German cities.

The transitions from one Ruhr city to another consist of relatively open suburbs and even open or agricultural fields. In some places, the borders between cities in the central Ruhr are unrecognizable due to continuous development across them.

Replanting of brownfield land has created new parks and recreation areas. The Emscher Landschaftspark (Emscher Landscape Park) lies along the River Emscher, formerly virtually an open sewer, parts of which have undergone natural restoration. This park connects strips of parkland running from north to south, which were developed through the regional planning in the 1920s, to form a green belt between the Ruhr cities from east to west.

History[link]

Middle Ages[link]

During the Middle Ages, much of the region that later was called Ruhrgebiet was situated in the Mark, the Duchies of Cleves and Berg and the territories of the bishop of Münster and the archbishop of Cologne. The region knew some medieval villages and castles but was mainly agrarian, its loess soil made it one of the richer parts of western Germany. The free imperial city of Dortmund was the trading and cultural centre, due to the Hellweg, an important east-west trading route, that brought prosperity to the town of Duisburg as well. Both towns were members of the Hanseatic League.

Industrial Revolution[link]

Zollverein Coal Mine Industrial Complex in Essen, an UNESCO World Heritage Site since 2001.

Zeche Zollern in Dortmund

The development of the region into an urbanized industrial area started in the late 18th century with the fortgoing early industrialisation in the nearby Wupper Valley in the Bergisches Land. Here around 1820 hundreds of water-powered mills were producing textile, lumber, shingles and iron in automated processes. And in even more workshops in the hills, highly skilled workers manufactured knives, tools, weapons and harnesses, using water, coal and charcoal. History has no official name for this phase of the industrial revolution, but one could call it the early waterpowered industrial revolution.

As the machines became bigger and transitioned from water- to steampower, local mined coal and charcoal became expensive and delivered insufficient burning power. The Bergische industry ordered more and more coal from the new coal mining area along Ruhr river.^[4] Impressive and expensive railways were constructed through the hilly Wupper region, to bring coal, and later steel, in from the Ruhr, and to carry products out to the world.^[5]

By 1850, there were almost 300 coal mines in operation in the Ruhr area, in and around the center cities Duisburg, Essen, Bochum and Dortmund. The coal was exported or processed in coking ovens into coke, needed to fuel blast furnaces, producing iron and steel. In this period the name Ruhrgebiet became common. Before the coal deposits along the Ruhr were used up, the mining industry moved northward to the Emscher and finally to the Lippe, drilling ever deeper mines as it went. Locks built at Mülheim on the Ruhr led to the expansion of Mülheim as a port. With the establishment of the Cologne-Minden railway in the late 19th century, several iron works were built within the borders of the present-day city of Oberhausen.

Migration[link]

The population climbed rapidly. Cities that in the early 19th century counted 2,000–5,000 inhabitants, grew in the following 100 years to over 100,000. Employers recruited skilled mine workers from other regions to the Ruhr's mines and steel mills and unskilled people started to move in. From 1860 onwards masses of new workers migrated from Silesia, Pomerania, East Prussia and Posen to the Ruhr. A majority of them were Polish-speakers and they were treated as second class citizens. In 1899 this led to a revolt in Herne of young Polish workers, who later established a Workers Union of their own. Skilled workers in the mines were often housed in so-called "miners’ colonies", constructed by the mining firms. At the end of the Prussian Kingdom over 3 million people lived in the Ruhrgebiet and the new coal-mining district had become the largest industrial region of Europe.^[6]

World War I[link]

During the first World War the Ruhrgebiet functioned as Germany's central weapon-factory. At a big Essen company the amount of employees in four years rose from 40,000 to 120,000. They were partly women, partly forced labourers.

Interbellum[link]

French and Belgian occupation[link]

In March 1921, French and Belgian troops occupied Duisburg, which according to the Treaty of Versailles formed part of the demilitarized Rhineland. In January 1923 the whole Ruhrgebiet was occupied as a reprisal after Germany failed to fulfill World War I reparation payments as agreed in the Versailles Treaty. The German government answered with "passive resistance", letting workers and civil servants refuse orders and instructions by the occupation forces.

Hyperinflation[link]

Production and transportation came to a standstill and the financial consequences contributed to German hyperinflation and ruined public finances in Germany. Passive resistance was called off in late 1923 allowing Germany to undertake a currency reform and to negotiate the Dawes Plan, which led to the withdrawal of French and Belgian troops from the Ruhr in 1925.

World War II[link]

During World War II, the "Ruhr 1940–1945" bombing caused a loss of 30% of plant and equipment (compared to 15–20% for the entire German industry).^[7] A second battle of the Ruhr (6/7 October 1944–end of 1944) is claimed to have begun with an attack on Dortmund.^{[8][verification needed]} In addition to the strategic bombing of the Ruhr, in April 1945, the Allies trapped several hundred thousand Wehrmacht troops in the Ruhr Pocket.

Post-World War II[link]

view of the redeveloped Duisburg Inner Harbour in 2010

Demilitarization[link]

The Level of Industry plans for Germany abolished all German munitions factories and civilian industries that could support them and severely restricted civilian industries of military potential. The French Monnet Plan pushed for an internationalization of the area,^[9] and the subsequent Ruhr Agreement was imposed as a condition for permitting for establishment of the Federal Republic of Germany.^[10]

During the Cold War, the Western allies anticipated that any Red Army thrust into Western Europe would begin in the Fulda Gap and have the Ruhr as a primary target. Increased German control of the area was limited by the pooling of German coal and steel into a multinational community in 1951. The nearby Saar region, containing much of Germany's remaining coal deposits, was handed over to economic administration by France as a protectorate in 1947 and did not politically return to Germany until January 1957, with economic reintegration occurring two years later. Parallel to the question of political control of the Ruhr, the Allies conducted an effort to decrease German industrial potential by limitations on production and dismantling of factories and steel plants, predominantly in the Ruhr. By 1950, after the virtual completion of the by-then much watered-down "level of industry" plans, equipment had been removed from 706 manufacturing plants in the west, and steel production capacity had been reduced by 6.7 million tons.^[11] Dismantling finally ended in 1951. In all, less than 5% of the industrial base was dismantled.^[12]

Economic miracle[link]

The Ruhr was at the center of the German economic miracle of the 1950s and 1960s, as very rapid economic growth at 9% a year created a heavy demand for coal and steel.

Decline after 1970[link]

After 1973, Germany was hard hit by a worldwide economic crisis, soaring oil prices, and persistently high unemployment, which jumped from 300,000 in 1973 to 1.1 million in 1975. The Ruhr region was hardest hit, as the easy-to-reach coal mines petered out, and German coal was no longer competitive. Likewise the Ruhr steel industry went into sharp decline, as its prices were undercut by lower-cost suppliers such as Japan. The welfare system provided a safety net for the large number of unemployed workers, and many factories reduce their labor force and began to concentrate on high-profit specialty items.^[13][14]

As demand for coal decreased after 1958, the area went through phases of structural crisis (see steel crisis) and industrial diversification, first developing traditional heavy industry, then moving into service industries and high technology. The air and water pollution of the area are largely a thing of the past although some issues take a long time to solve.^[15][16] In 2005, Essen^[17] was the official candidate for nomination as European Capital of Culture for 2010.

Demographics[link]

Largest cities[link]

The ten largest cities of the Ruhr:

Pos.	Name	Pop. 2010	Area (km²)	Pop. per km²	map
1	Dortmund	580,688	280.37	2,071
2	Essen	575,027	210.38	2,733
3	Duisburg	501,564	232.81	2,154
4	Bochum	385,626	145.43	2,652
5	Gelsenkirchen	268,102	104.86	2,557
6	Oberhausen	218,898	77.04	2,841
7	Hagen	196,934	160.36	1,228
8	Hamm	184,239	226.24	814
9	Herne	170,992	51.41	3,326
10	Mülheim an der Ruhr	169,917	91.29	1,861

Language[link]

The local dialect of German is commonly called Ruhrdeutsch or Ruhrpottdeutsch, although there is really no uniform dialect that justifies designation as a single dialect. It is rather a working class sociolect with influences from the various dialects found in the area and changing even with the professions of the workers. A major common influence stems from the coal mining tradition of the area. For example, quite a few locals prefer to call the Ruhr either "Kohlenpott", where "Pott" is a derivate of "Pütt" (pitmen's term for mine; cp. the English "pit"), or "Revier".

Migration[link]

Gastarbeiter, working at the Walsum mine (Duisburg)

During the 19th century the Ruhr attracted up to 500,000 ethnic Poles, Masurians and Silesians from East Prussia and Silesia in a migration known as Ostflucht. By 1925, the Ruhrgebiet had around 3.8 million inhabitants. Most of the new inhabitants migrated from Eastern Europe, however, immigrants also came from France, Ireland, and the United Kingdom. It has been claimed that immigrants came to the Ruhr from over 140 different nations. Almost all of their descendants today speak German only and due to various reasons they do not identify with their Polish roots and traditions, often only their Polish family names remaining as a sign of their past.

In 1900, the main concentrations of the Polish minority were:

• District of Gelsenkirchen (Westfalia) 13.1 %
• District of Bochum (Westfalia) 9.1 %
• District of Dortmund (Westfalia) 7.3 %
• City of Gelsenkirchen (Westfalia) 5.1 %

Official minority status and rights for Poles (Polish-speaking emigrants and their descendants) in Germany in general and in Ruhr specifically were revoked by Hermann Göring's World War II decree of 27 February 1940, and their property was confiscated. After World War II, even more immigrants originated from beyond German eastern and southern borders, first the former Polish, Russian and Ukrainian prisoners of war and slave-laborers of Nazi Germany who stayed in Ruhr, and then the guest workers from the south and other emigrants (Silesians, Masurians and Kashubians) from beyond the Iron Curtain. These guest workers or Gastarbeiter came mostly from Italy, Yugoslavia and Turkey and since the fall of communism most other Eastern European countries as well. Official minority status for Poles in Germany has never been restored nor Nazi-confiscated property returned, in spite of numerous promises and declarations by various German governments and European Community reports. Polish government signed a treaty with Germany called Treaty of Good Neighbourship on June 17, 1991 where official Polish minority status in Germany was not recognized whereas the German minority in Poland status was and has been since fully protected.

Culture[link]

This section requires expansion.

The city of Essen (representing the Ruhr) was selected as European Capital of Culture for 2010 by the Council of the European Union.

The Industrial Heritage Trail[link]

The Industrial Heritage Trail (German: Route der Industriekultur) links tourist attractions related to the European Route of Industrial Heritage in the Ruhr area.

Economy[link]

This section requires expansion.

headquarters of ThyssenKrupp AG in Essen

Largest companies[link]

(A–Z)

• Aldi
• Evonik Industries
• Franz Haniel & Cie.
• Hochtief
• Klöckner & Co.
• RWE
• Tengelmann
• ThyssenKrupp

Transport[link]

Road transport[link]

A 40 in Essen at night

Meiderich station of Verkehrsverbund Rhein-Ruhr

The Ruhr has one of the densest motorway networks in all of Europe, with dozens of Autobahns and Autobahn like Schnellstraßen (expressways) crossing the region. The Autobahn network is built in a grid network, with 4 east-west (A2, A40, A42, A44) and 7 north-south (A1, A3, A43, A45, A52, A57, A59) routes. A1, A2 and A3 are mostly used by through traffic, while other autobahns have a more regional function. Both A44 and A52 have several missing links, in various stages of planning. Some missing links are currently not considered to be constructed.

Additional expressways serve as bypasses and local routes, especially around Dortmund and Bochum. Due to the density of the autobahns and expressways, Bundesstraßes are less important for intercity traffic. The first Autobahns in the Ruhr opened during the mid-1930s. Due to the density of the network, and the number of alternate routes, traffic volumes are generally lower than other major metropolitan areas in Europe. Traffic congestion is an everyday occurrence, but far less compared to Randstad, another polycentric urban area. Most important Autobahns possess six lanes, but there are no eight-lane Autobahns in the Ruhr.

Public transport[link]

All public transport companies in the Ruhr are run under the umbrella of the Verkehrsverbund Rhein-Ruhr, which provides a uniform ticket system valid for the entire area. The Ruhr region is well-integrated into the Deutsche Bahn, both in passenger and cargo rail.

Air transport[link]

Düsseldorf International Airport serves as the interncontinental airport for North Rhine-Westphalia and is within 20 km for most of the Western Ruhr area. Dortmund Airport in the Eastern Ruhr is a mid-sized airport, offering scheduled flights to domestic and European destinations.

See also[link]

NRW portal

• Rhine-Ruhr
• Metropolitan regions in Germany
• Occupation of the Ruhr (1923–1924)
• Ruhrpolen
• Silesian metropolitan area
• Upper Silesian Coal Basin

Notes[link]

References[link]

• Botting, Douglas (1985). From the Ruins of the Reich: Germany 1945–1949. New York: Crown Publishing. ISBN 0-517-55865-3. 
• Bishop, Patrick. Bomber Boys Fighting Back 1940–1945
• French Directorate for Economic Affairs, Memorandum on the separation of the German industrial regions, 8 September 1945.
• Gareau, Frederick H. "Morgenthau's Plan for Industrial Disarmament in Germany", Western Political Quarterly, Vol. 14, No. 2 (Jun., 1961), pp. 517–53 in JSTOR
• Yoder, Amos. "The Ruhr Authority and the German Problem", Review of Politics, Vol. 17, No. 3 (Jul., 1955), pp. 345–358 in JSTOR

Further reading[link]

• Kift, Roy, Tour the Ruhr: The English language guide (3rd ed., 2008) (ISBN 3-88474-815-7) Klartext Verlag, Essen [1]
• Berndt, Christian. Corporate Germany Between Globalization and Regional Place Dependence: Business Restructuring in the Ruhr Area (2001)
• Crew, David. Town in the Ruhr: A Social History of Bochum, 1860–1914 (1979) (ISBN 0231043007)
• Fischer, Conan. The Ruhr Crisis, 1923–1924 (2003)
• Gillingham, John. "Ruhr Coal Miners and Hitler's War", Journal of Social History Vol. 15, No. 4 (Summer, 1982), pp. 637–653 in JSTOR* Chauncy D. Harris, "The Ruhr Coal-mining District", Geographical Review, 36 (1946), 194–221.
• Gillingham, John. Industry and Politics in the Third Reich: Ruhr Coal, Hitler, and Europe (1985) (ISBN 0231062605)
• Pounds, Norman J. G. The Ruhr: A Study in Historical and Economic Geography (1952) online
• Pierenkemper, Toni. "Entrepreneurs in Heavy Industry: Upper Silesia and the Westphalian Ruhr Region, 1852 to 1913", Business History Review Vol. 53, No. 1 (Spring, 1979), pp. 65–78 in JSTOR
• Royal Jae Schmidt. Versailles and the Ruhr: Seedbed of World War II (1968)
• Spencer, Elaine Glovka. "Employer Response to Unionism: Ruhr Coal Industrialists before 1914" Journal of Modern History Vol. 48, No. 3 (Sep., 1976), pp. 397–412 in JSTOR
• Spencer, Elaine Glovka. Management and Labor in Imperial Germany: Ruhr Industrialists as Employers, 1896–1914. Rutgers University Press. (1984) online
• Todd, Edmund N. "Industry, State, and Electrical Technology in the Ruhr Circa 1900", Osiris 2nd Series, Vol. 5, (1989), pp. 242–259 in JSTOR

External links[link]

Wikimedia Commons has media related to: Ruhrgebiet

Look up Ruhrgebiet in Wiktionary, the free dictionary.

Wikinews has related news: Themenportal_Ruhrgebiet

• Ruhr Tourism
• Post-Surrender Program for Germany (Sept. 1944)
• Ruhr Delegation of the United States of America, Council of Foreign Ministers American Embassy Moscow, March 24, 1947
• Draft, The President's Economic Mission to Germany and Austria, Report 3, March, 1947; OF 950B: Economic Mission as to Food…; Truman Papers.
• France, Germany and the Struggle for the War-making Natural Resources of the Rhineland Describes the contest for the Ruhr and Saar over the centuries.
• Ruhrgebietsbilder: Photos about the Ruhr

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Paradise Oskar
Background information
Birth name	Axel Ehnström
Born	(1990-10-23) October 23, 1990 (age 21)
Origin	Kirkkonummi, Finland
Years active	2011 –
Website	paradiseoskarmusic.com

Axel Ehnström, (born on 23 October 1990 in Kirkkonummi, Finland) and better known by his stage name Paradise Oskar, is a Finnish singer-songwriter. He represented Finland in the Eurovision Song Contest 2011 in Düsselldorf with the song "Da Da Dam".

Beginnings[link]

Ehnström's family belongs to the Swedish-speaking minority in Finland. He adopted the name Paradise Oskar from author Astrid Lindgren's children's book "Rasmus and the Vagabond", where Paradise Oskar is a vagabond who plays the accordion. Paradise Oskar is studying pop and jazz at the Helsinki Music Institute.

Eurovision Song Contest 2011[link]

Oskar participated in the Finnish national selection Euroviisut 2011 with the song "Da Da Dam" to represent Finland in the Eurovision Song Contest 2011 which was held in Düsseldorf, Germany in May 2011. The song tells a story of a boy who decides to make a stand to try to save the planet, gets universally ignored, but continues to persevere. Both lyrics and music are by the singer.

Oskar participated in the second semi-final of the national selection, and qualified for the final along with two other artists. In the final after the 10 artists performed their songs, Oskar along with Father McKenzie and Saara Aalto went through to the second round known as the "Super Final". Oskar was declared the winner, receiving the highest number of SMS and televotes with 46.7% of the votes.^[1]

Oskar won the Marcel Bezençon Press Award given to the best entry as voted on by the accredited media and press during the 2011 Eurovision event.^[2]

Debut album Sunday Songs 2011[link]

Paradise Oskar signed a record deal with Finland’s leading record company Warner Music Finland. Paradise Oskar's debut album Sunday Songs was released digitally on May 2 across Europe. All songs on the album are written and composed by Paradise Oskar himself. The producer for the album is Leri Leskinen who has worked with major local superstars in Finland. The executive producer is Warner Music Finland´s newly appointed A&R manager Lasse Kurki.

Discography[link]

Albums[link]

Singles[link]

References[link]

External links[link]

• Official Website (English)
• Paradise Oskar on Myspace