BIELEFELD | Synagogue Development News

[cello1974]

In the small city of Bielefeld, 329.000 inhabitants, the growing Jewish community bought a protestant chucrch to transform it into a synagogue! Due to immigration from Eastern Europe, the community of the city is already bigger than before WWII.
http://www.glaubeaktuell.net/media/Nachrichten_Glaube/synagoge2_8.jpg
That's how it will one look like!
http://www.dw-world.de/dw/article/0,2144,2695240,00.html

[Van der Rohe]

In the small city of Bielefeld, 329.000 inhabitants, the growing Jewish community bought a protestant chucrch to transform it into a synagogue! Due to immigration from Eastern Europe, the community of the city is already bigger than before WWII.
http://www.glaubeaktuell.net/media/Nachrichten_Glaube/synagoge2_8.jpg
That's how it will one look like!
http://www.dw-world.de/dw/article/0,2144,2695240,00.html

hmmm, 329.000 inhabitants is not a small city! It's at least a middle-sized city.

[samsonyuen]

Any pictures of what it looks like now?

[cello1974]

Yes, I took somepicson Thursday. I'll upload them these days,...

[Novak]

Sounds exciting. How old the protestant church is?

[cello1974]

^^ OOps, I will have to look it up at first. Sincerly I dunno! But it isn't that old,...

[germantower]

i am living 20km away from Bielefeld when ive got time I will try to find the location when i am the next time there and will post some pics.

But currently i only got my cell phone camera so dont expect good quality.

[Melinda]

I am against this project. We shouldn't allow to transform a Christian church in to a synagogue. It must be a new building.

And seeing this huge development in building Jewish centers and synagogues all over Germany we have to allow to build the big mosque in Köln as well.

Just my opinion. :)

[Golden Age]

A growing (self-confident) Jewish community in Germany is a highly positive sign of reconciliation and confidence in the postwar societal development of the country.

Should a Christian church be transformed into a synagogue? This is more an issue for the churches than for architects and politicians. If the chruch representatives don't see a problem, then let the project begin. It should, however, not be turned into a wedge issue like the mosque in Cologne where fear-monguering and name-calling have turned the debate into an ugly shouting match.

[cello1974]

Here are two pics I took of the former church :) :

http://img262.imageshack.us/img262/9021/20070823bielefeld0443pq2.jpg
http://img525.imageshack.us/img525/4373/20070823bielefeld0445wo2.jpg

[henner]

Is it in the Center of Bielefeld, or somwhere in the suburbs? By the way your city owns a very nice subway!

[cello1974]

It is just a bit outside the centre! ;)

[goschio]

Bielefeld got a subway? Wow

[phillybud]

I am against this project. We shouldn't allow to transform a Christian church in to a synagogue. It must be a new building.

And seeing this huge development in building Jewish centers and synagogues all over Germany we have to allow to build the big mosque in Köln as well.

Just my opinion. :)

Thousands, not hundreds, of religious buildings have changed denominations all over the United States. It's very, very common here. I live in Philadelphia, the 5th largest city in the US, in the western part of this city, known as University City/West Philadelphia. In the early 1900's a thriving Jewish community of over 250,000 lived here ... now the number has dwindled to perhaps one twentieth that number. We have several large imposing synogogues that are now churches. The vast majority of Jews moved to the lovely suburban towns of Philadelphia and worship in newer and modern synogogues such as the famous Beth Shalom Synogogue designed by Frank Lloyd Wright in Elkins Park, Pennsylvania. Ironically the last synogogue in West Philadelphia meets in the former Calvary Church. In the Lower East Side section of Manhattan, New York City, several synogogues are now Buddhist Temples!:kiss: :okay: :hug: :grouphug:

[cello1974]

Bielefeld got a subway? Wow

Yes, it has.
http://www.agrob-buchtal.de/dscb_abo_site/products/data/3/pe_96_24_1_ankunft_abreise_01_g.jpg
http://www.urbanrail.net/deutschland/bi/bi-hbf1.jpg
http://www.urbanrail.net/deutschland/bi/bi-hbf2.jpg
http://www.urbanrail.net/deutschland/bi/nordpark1.jpg
http://www.urbanrail.net/deutschland/bi/r-oetker-halle1.jpg
http://www.urbanrail.net/deutschland/bi/siegfriedpl1.jpg
http://www.urbanrail.net/deutschland/bi/jahnplatz1.jpg
http://www.trampicturebook.de/tram/germany/bielefel/spinne_gross.gif
hauptbahnhof has even 3 levels... :cheers:

[german_beowulf]

This is a "Stadtbahn". A Strassenbahn (tram) with tunnels under the citycenters. A very effective transportation system for midsized cities.

Average speed in Dusseldorf:
# Straßenbahn: 17 km/h (tram)
# Stadtbus: 20 km/h (city bus)
# Regionalbus: 25 km/h (regional bus)
# Stadtbahn: 29 km/h
# S-Bahn: 35 bis 50 km/h