There is definitely something about abandoned theme parks which capture the imagination and they are always popular posts on websites detailing abandoned locations. The Pripyat amusement park is probably the most famous example with the Ferris wheel in particular becoming an iconic image.
Spreepark, otherwise known as Kulturpark Plänterwald Berlin is less well known but has been the subject of some fascinating features on sites such as Atlas Obscura and World Abandoned. The swan rides are especially evocative of that eerie atmosphere and, to borrow a phrase, 'morbid charisma' empty and abandoned amusement parks create.
My card is bright and colourful but the history of the park after abandonment proves that bright and colourful does not equal happy and joyful.
VEB Kulturpark Berlin was opened on the 4th October 1969 . It was conceived as a Socialist Disney Land and as the GDR's only permanent theme park it proved very popular with visitors attracting 1.5m visitors a year. I wonder how many of them knew that the rides were imported from the west?
There isn't much information about the park pre-Wende, but an upgraded version of the Ferris Wheel was unveiled in October 1989 to mark the 40th anniversary of the GDR, appropriately this new version stood 40 metres high and had 40 cabins.
As mentioned earlier, the Berlin Wall fell in November that year and with more freedom of movement, the uniqueness of Kulturpark Berlin was no longer a selling point and visitor numbers fell by a third. After that, things only got worse.
In 1991 it was sold to a Norbert Witte who had previously been convicted of manslaughter after a carousel malfunction killed seven at a carnival in Hamburg. It's not clear how he was able to buy it but it's believed he did so in his wife's name.
While he did add new attractions which saw visitor numbers rise again, by 1999 they had fallen once more and the park faced debts of eleven million Euros .Two years later, the company was insolvent. Earlier the next year Witte moved to Lima taking a number of the attractions and several colleagues with him, while he claimed that the attractions were being sent for repair he actually wanted to set u a similar park there . The park closed later that year and has not reopened as a theme park but has been used a film location and guided tours were given until 2014, two fires that same year caused major damage to the remaining attractions and it is uncertain what will become of this relic of the GDR .
If you wondering what happened to Herr Witte failing in this endeavour to build another version of Kulturark in Lima ,he and his son tried drug smuggling instead, they were caught and Witte Jr is serving a lengthy gaol term.
So there have been no fairy-tale endings for the so called Socialist Disneyland.
