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Hanover
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About Hanover
Hanover may have been a bit of late starter, with the
city not founded until the 12th century and not coming
to prominence until the 17th, but it has more than made
up for lost time...today it is one of Germany‘s richest
cities. The story starts back in the days of the Hanseatic
League, when this north German city used its proximity
to the Baltic Sea to emerge as a serious economic player.
The golden age came in the 17th century, when a complex
interweaving of marriages and political machinations in
England, to avoid a Scottish Catholic monarch taking the
throne, resulted in Hanover‘s royalty holding sway of
Britain. Hanoverian George I became the British king,
despite the fact that he could not speak English and
chose to spend much of his time holed up back in his
native city.
By the 20th century, the British royal connection had
been long since cut and British bombers returned in
World War II, to mete out a severe beating...over
80% of the city centre was flattened. Today, a painstaking
reconstruction programme...somewhat ironically instigated
by the occupying Allied forces in the post-war years...
has brought back a sense of grandeur, although there are
few of the fine architectural set pieces that grace many
other German cities. What Hanover does have, however, are
first rate shopping opportunities, excellent examples of
Hanseatic red-brick churches, a brace of interesting
museums, a sprinkling of atmospheric beer halls and a
string of relaxing civic parks..the highlight of which
is the Herrenhäuser Gärten, a fittingly grandiose and
expansive legacy of its days as a royal city.
The city is well geared toward tourists and visiting
businessmen alike, with an array of hotels, an integrated
public transport system and the “Red Thread”...a four-kilometre
(three-mile) red line that traces the way to most of
Hanover‘s main attractions, with an informative handbook
on sale to fill in the blanks. The city‘s economy is
dominated by the Messegelände to the southeast, Germany‘s
largest, and one of Europe‘s most high-tech, show and
exhibition grounds, which hauls in millions of visitors
every year, who attend the various business and leisure
events. This vast area was also home to Expo 2000, the
first World Expo ever to be held on German soil. Compared
to Lisbon 1998, the Expo was an unmitigated disaster,
with visitor numbers a fraction of those anticipated and
a welter of negative publicity. But a few years further
on, it appears that the local authorities may have been
shrewd by attracting the massive state funding that went
with the project. Hanover‘s main railway station has been
rejuvenated, the city was put firmly on the map and the
Expo site has become a permanent asset, as well as another
potential conference venue. The Expo site, like the rest of
Hanover, is at its best in the summer months, when the city
can see as much as seven hours of sunshine per day, with an
average temperature of 21°C. Nevertheless, this drops to as
little as one hour of sunshine in the depths of winter and a
chilly average temperature of only 3°C...perfect weather for
seeking refuge in the beer halls and cosy restaurants.
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