Pedestrian zone

Munich's central pedestrian zone connects the Stachus with the Marienplatz. You can hardly imagine it today: Where up to 120,000 passers-by now stroll day after day, streetcars rattled, cars jostled and buses departed in the 1960s. On June 30, 1972, just in time for the Olympic Games, the pedestrian zone opened. Today, the shopping mile is one of the highest-turnover shopping streets in Germany. Munich owes this to a far-sighted urban development plan. Decades ago, this plan provided for the gradual establishment of car-free zones. And without the creation of this spacious pedestrian zone, Munich's old town would certainly not have the flair for which it is famous all over the world today. The father of the pedestrian zone was the architect Bernhard Winkler. He designed the furniture and many of the fountains. In recent years, the pedestrian zone has been expanded, for example, to include Sendlinger Straße. The extension of the pedestrian zone towards the Isartor, the street in the valley, is also to become a strongly calmed or traffic-free area in the long term as part of the plans for a "car-free old town".