Karlsruhe

a city in Baden-Württemberg, in the Federal Republic of Germany (FRG), near the Rhine, with which it is linked by canal. Population, 259, 100 (1970).

Karlsruhe is a major transport hub and river port, with five harbors. Its freight turnover came to 10.7 million tons in 1970. The city is also the fuel-distribution center for the southwestern part of the FRG, receiving oil by ship and by pipeline from Marseille. The city’s major industry includes oil refining (which produced 14.8 million tons of petroleum products in 1968), the construction of transport and electrical-engineering machinery, metalworking, chemicals manufacture, printing, and food processing. At Leopoldshafen, 10 km north of Karlsruhe, there is an atomic research center. A university, a state academy of fine arts, the Baden State Museum (with collections of antiquities), and an art museum (Kunsthalle) are also located in the city. Karlsruhe was founded in 1715 by Margrave Karl Wilhelm of Baden, and during the 18th and 19th centuries it was expanded according to a strict geometric plan (radial-annular). From the palace, built in a baroque style by the architects L. P. de la Guêpière and A. F. von Kesslau (1752–82), tree-lined walks fan out to the north and the streets of the city fan out to the south. During the first third of the 19th century the architect F. Weinbrenner filled the city with buildings in the classical style. New Karlsruhe, to the south, has buildings of the 19th and 20th centuries. The settlement of Dammerstock, designed by the architect W. Gropius in 1927–28, is located not far from Karlsruhe.