New Apple Store Opening Soon in Berlin With Special Wallpaper Available for iPhone, iPad, and Mac

[BlairMALL]

I live in Berlin. Guess the wallpaper is a reference to the pipes we have for construction sites here. There have been a lot of these in the whole city in recent years. Pink pipes in Berlin

Thanks! I was trying to guess the connection, but kept coming up blank. This helps.

 

[tom_uk]

I believe the pipes are a remnant from the DDR (East Germany), when hot water (especially for heating during the winter) was centrally heated in massive industrial complexes then distributed through these pipes to all buildings (commercial, government, residential) throughout the city.

After reunification, individual boilers were introduced into each building as needed, rendering these hot water distribution systems obsolete.

Nice idea, but not so. They’re drainage pipes, especially associated with construction sites. Apparently Berlin is located on swampy ground, so whenever anyone digs down, water comes up - and has to be got rid of. Here’s an old BBC News report about them: https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/av/magazine-24773752

 

[idktbh]

?...

 

[CalfCanuck]

Nice idea, but not so. They’re drainage pipes, especially associated with construction sites. Apparently Berlin is located on swampy ground, so whenever anyone digs down, water comes up - and has to be got rid of. Here’s an old BBC News report about them: https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/av/magazine-24773752

Drainage is most surely what they are used for today, and that might have been a part of their use in the DDR years. But these high exposed pipes are located in many cities, from Berlin east to Poland to Russia and down south to Ukraine. And once built they were likely used for all sorts of supply lines. But the key thing for northern climates is having winter heating, because no district-wide hot water meant all home were cold in the winter. That was their primary use.

A hot water heating network above ground is cheap to build and easy to repair, while allowing for better insulation. The downside is it looks god-awful, so while they used throughout the East Bloc above ground pipes like this were much rarer in Western countries.

BTW, I live on a barrier island, where the water table is inches below the surface and our water pipes are laid deeper.. Production platforms have oil pipelines crossing the US Gulf on the seabed, and every water utility runs pipes through completely saturated soil structures. That's why pipes are a sealed system.

Here's a current photo from a company in the Ruhr, in North Rhine-Westphalia, that supplies heat to 300,000 homes.

https://www.steag-energyservices.com/en/media/press-releases/detail/20-10-2020-congratulations-steag-fernwaerme

District heating

As a regional energy company, we supply private households, major customers and real estate companies with environmentally friendly district heating, most of which is supplied by combined heat and power plants.

www.steag.com

Plus an informed answer (see #2) from Quota:

Why are there so many exposed pipes in Berlin? They are almost everywhere in Mitte. What are they for?

Answer (1 of 2): Berlin is essentially built on a swamp. The ground water level in the city is high. Every time they start construction in the city, water can flood the construction sites. The water then needs to be pumped out. The water is normally pumped out to the nearest waterway or larger ca...

www.quora.com

Frank Kemper, deeply convinced European
Answered 4 years ago · Author has 6.5K answers and 21M answer views

They are part of a system called “Fernwärme”, which you could translate into “heating over large distances”. A power plant produces large amounts of hot water and distributes them to houses for heating purposes. It is used to supply large appartement buildings in big cities. The main advantage is that one powerplant can replace thousands of ovens, this reduces the danger of fires. Besides this the one powerplant may be cheaper to run. “Fernwärme” is distributed in many big German cities. However, in cities of West Germany the big pipes usually are buried under the surface. Berlin Mitte was part of East Berlin until 1990. In East Germany many “Fernwärme” Networks were built with tubes above the surface, because that was easier, cheaper and faster to build.

 

[indigena]

I believe the pipes are a remnant from the DDR (East Germany), when hot water (especially for heating during the winter) was centrally heated in massive industrial complexes then distributed through these pipes to all buildings (commercial, government, residential) throughout the city.

After reunification, individual boilers were introduced into each building as needed, rendering these hot water distribution systems obsolete.

This is wrong. District heating (Fernwärme) is something still very common in Berlin. I do live in a building from 2016 which is heated by district heating. The district heating network is being constantly extended and modernised and I believe Berlin has the largest district heating system in the world. It is more environmental friendly than gas or oil which is why the expansion is constantly ongoing.
For more information check the Vattenfall district heating website: https://sustainablecities.vattenfall.com/en/berlin

The pipes from the pictures are for ground water and being used for construction sites around the city.

 

[Mr.PT]

I live in Berlin. Guess the wallpaper is a reference to the pipes we have for construction sites here. There have been a lot of these in the whole city in recent years. Pink pipes in Berlin

Decades not years. Every time you dig a plot for construction you’ll most certainly have to deal with constant pumping to ensure sufficient “dry” conditions to build. But you have to keep moisturising the vicinity soils so they don’t become to dry and collapse…in short continuous pumping

 

[svish]

Nice wallpaper! Looking forward to seeing more pictures from the new apple store.

 

[DanTSX]

A series of tubes!