Wikipedia:WikiProject Germany/Portal:Baden-Württemberg
Introduction
Baden-Württemberg (/ˌbɑːdən ˈvɜːrtəmbɜːrɡ/ BAH-dən VURT-əm-burg, German: [ˌbaːdn̩ ˈvʏʁtəmbɛʁk] ⓘ), commonly shortened to BW or BaWü, is a German state (Land) in Southwest Germany, east of the Rhine, which forms the southern part of Germany's western border with France. With more than 11.07 million inhabitants across a total area of nearly 35,752 km2 (13,804 sq mi), it is the third-largest German state by both area (behind Bavaria and Lower Saxony) and population (behind North Rhine-Westphalia and Bavaria). As a federated state, Baden-Württemberg is a partly-sovereign parliamentary republic. The largest city in Baden-Württemberg is the state capital of Stuttgart, followed by Mannheim and Karlsruhe. Other major cities are Freiburg im Breisgau, Heidelberg, Heilbronn, Pforzheim, Reutlingen, Tübingen, and Ulm.
What is now Baden-Württemberg was formerly the historical territories of Baden, Prussian Hohenzollern, and Württemberg. Baden-Württemberg became a state of West Germany in April 1952 through the merger of South Baden, Württemberg-Baden, and Württemberg-Hohenzollern. These three states had been artificially created by the Allies after World War II out of the existing traditional states by their separation over different occupation zones.
Baden-Württemberg is especially known for its strong economy with various industries like car manufacturing, electrical engineering, mechanical engineering, the service sector, and more. It has the third-highest gross regional product (GRP) in Germany. Part of the Four Motors for Europe and located in the Blue Banana, some of the largest German companies are headquartered in Baden-Württemberg, including Mercedes-Benz Group, Schwarz Group, Porsche, Bosch and SAP.
The sobriquet Ländle, a diminutive of the word Land in the local Swabian, Alemannic and Franconian dialects, is sometimes used as a synonym for Baden-Württemberg. (Full article...)
Selected article
The Murg Valley Railway (German: Murgtalbahn) is a 58 kilometre long railway line in the Northern Black Forest in Germany, that links Rastatt and Freudenstadt. It was opened in stages from 1868 to 1928 being built outwards from both Rastatt and Freudenstadt. The route through the narrow Murg Valley required the construction of numerous tunnels and bridges. The section between the stations of Baiersbronn and Freudenstadt Stadt is a steep ramp which is why it had to be operated until 1926 as a rack railway. Even today it can only be worked by vehicles that have the required approval.
After the occasional long-distance passenger services had been withdrawn in the 1990s, the Murg Valley Railway was integrated into the network of the Karlsruhe Stadtbahn between 2002 and 2004. Since then it has been operated by Albtal-Verkehrs-Gesellschaft (AVG), using their fleet of tram-trains. At Freudenstadt, these meet the services of the Ortenau S-Bahn (OSB), operating over the Kinzig Valley Railway to Offenburg.
Selected biography
Hans Bayer, known by the pseudonym Thaddäus Troll, (18 March 1914 – 5 July 1980) was a German journalist and writer and one of the most prominent modern poets in the Swabian German dialect. In his later years he was also an active campaigner for libraries and for support, pension rights and fair publishing contracts for writers. He was born in Bad-Cannstatt, a suburb of Stuttgart and committed suicide there at the age of 66. The literary award, Thaddäus-Troll-Preis, is named in his honour. His family had a soap-making business in the town. After he finished his secondary education at the Johannes-Kepler-Gymnasium, he worked briefly as a volunteer at a newspaper in Cannstatt. He then studied German, art history, comparative literature, theater, and journalism at the universities of Tübingen, Munich, Halle, and Leipzig, receiving his doctorate in 1938 from Leipzig University.
State facts
- Nickname: Ländle
- Capital: Stuttgart
- Minister-president: Winfried Kretschmann
- Governing parties: Greens / CDU
- Total area: 35,751 km2 (13,804 sq mi)
- Population: 10,879,618 (2015)
- Founded: April 25, 1952
- Website: www.baden-wuerttemberg.de
Selected image
Georg-Elser-Museum in Königsbronn; dedicated to Georg Elser, who attempted to assassinate Adolf Hitler with a selfmade bomb in 1939.
Did you know?
- ...that Porsche was founded in 1931, with main offices in the centre of Stuttgart? One of the first assignments the new company received was from the German government to design a car for the people, that is a "Volkswagen".
- ...that Lake Constance is colloquially known as the Swabian Sea (das schwäbische Meer)? The lake itself is an important drinking water source for southwestern Germany, called Bodensee-Wasserversorgung ("Lake Constance Water Supply").
Subcategories
- Select [►] to view subcategories
Selected panorama
The New Palace (German: Neues Schloss) is an 18th century Baroque palace and is one of the last large city palaces built in Southern Germany. The palace is located in the center of Stuttgart on the Schlossplatz in front of the Jubiläumssäule column and Königsbau. Public tours of the building are only permitted by special arrangement, as the building contains some government offices.
Topics
Related portals
Associated Wikimedia
The following Wikimedia Foundation sister projects provide more on this subject:
-
Commons
Free media repository -
Wikibooks
Free textbooks and manuals -
Wikidata
Free knowledge base -
Wikinews
Free-content news -
Wikiquote
Collection of quotations -
Wikisource
Free-content library -
Wikiversity
Free learning tools -
Wikivoyage
Free travel guide -
Wiktionary
Dictionary and thesaurus