Street Disco
Berlin / Germany /1669
For nearly 70 years, two bridges to nowhere have stood silent, taking no one to their destination. The Liesenbrücken, once vital connectors, were abandoned in 1957 in favor of newer bridges better suited to the times. Since then, they have stood as weathered monuments, rusting with a stubborn permanence and serving no functional purpose. The Liesenbrücken had front-row seats to all these sorry events. The Berlin Wall passed underneath. The only visitors for many years were members of the Nationale Volksarmee (NVA), or East German National People’s Army, who used to keep watch from a neighboring watchtower. The Berlin Wall skirted along Liesenstraße from the Chausseestraße checkpoint, turned right under the bridges and down beside Gartenstraße to where the visitor center is today. You can still see some of the old Berlin Wall off the tourists’ beaten path beside the Liesenbrücken. These silent structures remain, echoing the divided history of Berlin while awaiting a renewed purpose in the city’s ever-evolving landscape.
