The Mitte quarter is located within the Cityring - a series of roads that surround the city center - and extends southwards to the location of the Maschpark and the
New Town Hall.
Old Town The historic
old town of Hanover is located in the Mitte quarter between the
Leine River, Friedrichswall, Georgstraße and Goethestraße. Due to the
bombings in the Second World War, the historic old town was almost completely destroyed. Only in the Kramerstraße area (where the
Broyhanhaus is located) and Burgstraße area (which contains the oldest half-timbered house in the city) were some half-timbered houses preserved or translocated to here. The
Aegidienkirche, which was destroyed in the war, was not rebuilt; its ruins now serves as a memorial to the victims of wars and violence. Formative historical buildings in the old town include the
Marktkirche, the
Old Town Hall, the Seilwinderhaus and the Ballhof Theatre. The
Landtag of Lower Saxony, the state parliament, resides today in the
Leineschloss at Hannah-Arendt-Platz. Remains of the historic city wall and the Beguinage Tower were integrated into the
Historisches Museum Hannover, designed in 1966 by architect
Dieter Oesterlen. The Kreuzkirchenviertel around the
Kreuzkirche was completely redesigned after the war and built in the style of the 1950s. The old town is characterized by a variety of gastronomic offers. For over 40 years, the Altstadt-Flohmarkt flea market has taken place on Saturdays on the Hohe Ufer, a waterfront road running along the eastern side of the Leine. The market hall, known as the "belly of Hanover," offers a rich variety of food and gastronomy at 73 stands covering .
Other neighborhoods The area between the Georgstraße and the railway was developed in the middle of the 19th century by
Georg Laves into the Ernst-August-Stadt, or Ernst August City. As a result of the subway construction, large areas of the city center in the
Kröpcke, Georgstraße, Georgsplatz and Bahnhofstraße area became a
pedestrian zone. The Kröpcke subway station is the most important station of the
Hanover Stadtbahn light rail system. In the immediate vicinity are the
Staatsoper Hannover opera house, the
Schauspiel Hannover theater and other cultural venues. The Bahnhofstraße flows into the Ernst-August-Platz plaza, the forecourt of the
Hannover Hauptbahnhof, which is the main
railway station for the city of Hanover. In October 2008, the Ernst August Gallery, a three-storey ECE shopping center with specialty shops, service and catering establishments, opened northwest of the main station. A smaller shopping center is the Ernst-August-Carrée, which was built from the 2000s in a historic building complex that had long served as an administrative building for the Deutsche Bundesbahn. At the beginning of the 19th century northwest of the city of Hanover, the Steintor garden community was divided into eight separate villages in 1829. In 1843, it was united together with the six villages of the Aegidientor garden community to form the Vorstadt Hannover, or Hanover Suburbs. It was incorporated into Hanover in 1859. On the Klagesmarkt
town square on 31 March 1979, the largest anti-nuclear demonstration to date and still the largest demonstration in Lower Saxony took place with about 100,000 participants. It was the final rally of the Gorleben-Treck demonstration against the use of nuclear energy, which began a week earlier in
Wendland. The area formerly belonging to the Oststadt between Hamburger Alley and Berliner Alley, as well as the railway was assigned to the Mitte district after the Second World War, became part of the Cityring. In the course of the expansion of the city, the suburbs of Fernrode (the area northwest of the Alte Celler Heerstraße, known today as Lister Mile) and Bütersworth (the area southeast of Fernrode) had emerged. At or near the Raschplatz plaza is the Hanover District Court, a
CinemaxX cinema, the cinema at Raschplatz, discos, and bars. The Hanover Central Bus Station was newly built in 2013-14 next to its previous location. The U-Bahn-Station Hauptbahnhof is one of the most important stops of the Hanover
U-Bahn. The
Warmbüchenviertel (historical name Kirchwende) is located between the streets Schiffgraben, Marienstraße and Berliner Alley. The district is characterized by insurance and other office buildings, and at the same time it is a residential district close to the city center. == Calenberger Neustadt ==