The Liberation Monument
Erected in 1946 at the French occupation's initiative, standing in an everyday square.
Elżbieta Fazel — CC BY-SA 3.0 · Leonhard Lenz — CC0 · Leonhard Lenz — CC0 · Leonhard Lenz — CC0
For two reasons: its severe contemporary form in a historic city, and that it turned the surroundings of a memorial to Nazi victims into a place for playing and skating. The city debated this publicly and decided everyday use is more honest than solemn isolation. Read the monument's plaque — it explains the position.
Minutes. This is not a destination to allocate a visit to but a point you pass walking between the old town and Maria-Theresien-Straße. Stop to read the plaque and carry on.
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A large square south of the old town, known locally as Landhausplatz, redesigned in 2011 from a car park into a continuous pale concrete surface with no kerbs, shaped into gentle contours, low steps and ramps. The design won architecture prizes and caused an argument at the same time. The idea was an open space with no assigned function, used however people choose, and the result is a square where young people skate, older people sit and children play. The argument is about what the square contains: the Liberation Monument, erected in 1946 at the initiative of the French occupation forces, and beside it the Neues Landhaus, built under National Socialist rule. That people skate around a memorial to the victims of that period is something the city debated at length, and its decision was that ordinary life around the monument is better than a solemn empty plaza. The visit is short — minutes on the walk between the old town and Maria-Theresien-Straße — but it shows how an Austrian city handles a past it does not want to hide.
Erected in 1946 at the French occupation's initiative, standing in an everyday square.
The city chose ordinary life around the monument over a solemn empty plaza.
Built under National Socialist rule and still a seat of government.
Eduard-Wallnöfer-Platz (Landhausplatz), Innsbruck