Hoenheim tram terminal

The Zaha Hadid-designed terminal: tram and bus station, a park-and-ride and a bicycle parking area

Invited to design the Hoenheim-Gare multimodal terminal, Iraqi-born British architect Zaha Hadid came up with a design that managed to be both sweepingly elegant and functional. Typical of her style, the building does without straight lines and parallel walls, featuring instead overlapping fields and lines in a constantly shifting whole.

The Hoenheim multimodal terminal (25,000 m²) includes a park-and-ride with 700 spaces, a tram and bus station of 3000 m², a bike park (50 places), shops and public facilities. The overlapping-fields concept echoes the movements of cars, trams, bicycles and pedestrians.

Winner of the European union prize for contemporary architecture –Mies van der Rohe Award 2003

The tram station is covered by a raw concrete canopy, folded like a sheet of paper and supported by 44 irregularly-positioned obliquely-angled pillars offering an immediate impression of dynamism. Contrasting effects of light and shadow are created by narrow openings cut into the concrete floor and at night, the terminal appears to be built on columns of light.

In the car park, floor marks and light posts delineate the parking spaces, in the form of a magnetic field, and gently curve around to follow the perimeter of the site, creating a paradoxical impression of “immobile movement”.

The terminal won the European union prize for contemporary architecture –Mies van der Rohe Award 2003.