Uploaded on 2018-09-16 by Lars Rybak

The Photo was taken in the heart of Berlin´s Mitte district, left to the former site of the “People's Chamber” of the GDR, now occupied by the newly erected reconstruction of the historic Berlin city castle. As both buildings represented the then legislative powers, their location was chosen due to its central position, defined by the convergence of major transportation routes including the Spree river. You can see from the hotel (left), residential (middle left) and office (middle right) structures that over time, it has become a highly densified mixed use area. Initially this micro area was anything but highly populated (rather than the adjacent parts of the city to the east which were the historic origin of Berlin), but became so as due to representative purposes, pathways have been enlarged and thereby supported the settlement of a supplemental urban system - even though the Spree causes the surrounding plots to be difficult to build upon (destabilising groundwater). So, from a property development point of view, it occurs to be the availability of infrastructure that attracts further activity, be it by way of densification of existing structures, often resulting in high-rises with an ever-increasing demand for urban infrastruture.