Prinzenstraße (Berlin U-Bahn)

File:U-Bahn Berlin U1 Prinzenstrasse.jpg

U-Bahnhof Prinzenstraße, U1 platform

Prinzenstraße is a Berlin U-Bahn station located on the U1.

Overview

It is located roughly where the eponymous street crosses the Landwehrkanal in Kreuzberg. The nearby Böcklerpark, a small park with a hall where music events are often held, and the Sommerbad Kreuzberg swimming pool, colloquially called Prinzenbad, are among the most popular venues in central Kreuzberg. The street and subsequently the station were named after Prince William I, the later German Emperor.

File:U-Bahn Berlin Prinzenstraße 1900.jpg

U-Bahn station Prinzenstraße, about 1900

The station on the first Berlin U-Bahn line from Potsdamer Platz to Stralauer Tor was opened on February 18, 1902. Because the station is on a viaduct above the junction of Prinzenstraße and Gitschiner Straße, a street level entrance hall could only be erected on its south side on the grounds of a gas plant, while the stairs to the northern platform had to be included in the opposite residential building.

Destroyed in World War II, the station was rebuilt in the 1950s. It later received new entrance halls in a hotly disputed Postmodern style, in 1984 for the north wing and 1991 for the south wing. Inside, a preserved detail of the old station is found at the northern platform, a small sculpture of a frog with a crown and a ball, alluding to the Frog Prince fairy tale.

References

Preceding station		Berlin U-Bahn		Following station
Hallesches Tor towards Uhlandstraße		U1		Kottbusser Tor towards Warschauer Straße