Good Christmas trade

The retail trade is satisfied. On Saturday, the day before the third Advent, there were good sales. People buy less, but more expensive gifts, said Ulf Kalkmann, speaker of Hamburg retail trade. Indeed, concerning 2009, the retail trade is afraid of suffering a heavy loss because of the global financial crisis.

Hamburg Airport With More Convenience for Travellers

From now on, flying from Hamburg is even more convenient than before: the new suburban train S 1 transports passengers from Hamburg city centre to the airport.

From Monday to Friday, the train arrives every 10 minutes, during the weekend passengers are being transported every 20 minutes.

Heavy luggage will be no problem as the new suburban train-station does also offer escalators and lifts in order to facilitate transportation.

Hamburg plans to finance its new HafenCity University itself, according to reports published by Welt-online. The search for a private investor for the €60-million project has not been successful. Therefore, the Senate has decided to pay for the building with public funds.

Senator Dr. Gundlach was one of the speakers at the opening ceremony on Friday. (photo:www.hamburg.de)

When new public buildings are constructed, media reports usually cover increase of costs due to bad planning or delay. It is a rare thing indeed for a building to be done on schedule, and even rarer for one to be finished ahead of time, as happened with the new annex at the University Medical Center Hamburg-Eppendorf (UKE), which was opened on Friday.