The town is believed to have been founded by the counts ofAndechs probably around the mid-12th century,[3] but was first mentioned in 1194 asBaierrute in a document by BishopOtto II ofBamberg. The syllable-rute may meanRodung or "clearing", whilstBaier- indicates immigrants from the Bavarian region.
Already documented earlier, were villages later merged into Bayreuth:Seulbitz (in 1035 as the royalSalian estate of Silewize in a document by EmperorConrad II) and St. Johannis (possibly 1149 asAltentrebgast). Even the district ofAltstadt (formerlyAltenstadt) west of the town centre must be older than the town of Bayreuth itself. Even older traces of human presence were found in the hamlets ofMeyernberg: pieces of pottery and wooden crockery were dated to the 9th century based on their decoration.[4]
While Bayreuth was previously (1199) referred to as avilla ("village"), the termcivitas ("town") appeared for the first time in a document published in 1231. One can therefore assume that Bayreuth was awarded itstown charter between 1200 and 1230. The town was ruled until 1248 by thecounts of Andechs-Merania. After they died out in 1260 the burgraves ofNuremberg from theHouse of Hohenzollern took over the inheritance.
As early as 1361 EmperorCharles IV conferred on BurgraveFrederick V the right to mint coins for the towns of Bayreuth and Kulmbach.
In 1398 Bayreuth was partitioned from Nuremberg, becoming thePrincipality of Bayreuth (German:Fürstentum Bayreuth). Until 1604, however, the princely residence and the centre of the territory was the castle ofPlassenburg inKulmbach and as such the territory was officially known as the Principality of Kulmbach. The town of Bayreuth developed slowly and was affected time and again by disasters.
Bayreuth was first published on a map in 1421.
In February 1430, theHussites devastated Bayreuth and the town hall and churches were razed.Matthäus Merian described this event in 1642 as follows:"In 1430 the Hussites from Bohemia attacked / Culmbach and Barreut / and committed great acts of cruelty / like wild animals / against the common people / and certain individuals. / The priests / monks and nuns they either burnt at the stake / or took them onto the ice of lakes and rivers / (in Franconia and Bavaria) and doused them with cold water / and killed them in a deplorable way / as Boreck reported in the Bohemian Chronicle, page 450".[5]
In 1605 a great fire, caused by negligence, destroyed 137 of the town's 251 houses. In 1620plague broke out and, in 1621, there was another big fire in the town. The town also suffered during theThirty Years' War.
The Old Castle
A turning point in the town's history came in 1603 when MargraveChristian, the son of the elector,John George of Brandenburg, moved the aristocratic residence from the castle ofPlassenburg aboveKulmbach to Bayreuth. The first Hohenzollern palace was built in 1440–1457 under MargraveJohn the Alchemist. It was the forerunner of today's Old Palace (Altes Schloss) and was expanded and renovated many times. The development of the new capital stagnated due to theThirty Years' War, but afterwards manybaroque buildings were added to the town. After Christian's death in 1655 his grandson,Christian Ernest, followed him, ruling from 1661 until 1712. He was an educated and well-travelled man, whose tutor had been the statesmanJoachim Friedrich von Blumenthal. He founded the Christian-Ernestinum Grammar School and, in 1683, participated in the liberation ofVienna which had been besieged by the Turks. To commemorate this feat, he had theMargrave Fountain built as a monument on which he is depicted as the victor of the Turks; it now stands outside the New Palace (Neues Schloss). During this time, the outer ring of the town wall and the castle chapel (Schlosskirche) were built.
The New CastleTheMargravial Opera House (UNESCO World Heritage Site)Margravial Opera House, Interior
Christian Ernest's successor, the Crown Prince and later Margrave,George William, began in 1701 to establish the then independent town ofSt Georgen am See (today, the district of St Georgen) with its castle, the so-calledOrdensschloss, a town hall, a prison and a small barracks. In 1705 he founded the Order of Sincerity (Ordre de la Sincérité), which was renamed in 1734 to theOrder of the Red Eagle and had the monastery church built, which was completed in 1711. In 1716 a princelyporcelain factory was established in St. Georgen.
The first 'castle' in the park of theHermitage was built at this time by Margrave George William (1715–1719).
In 1721, the town council acquired the palace of Baroness Sponheim (today's Old Town Hall orAltes Rathaus) as a replacement for the town hall built in 1440 in the middle of the market place and destroyed by fire.
In 1735, a nursing home, the so-calledGravenreuthStift, was founded by a private foundation in St. Georgen. The cost of the building exceeded the funds of the foundation, but Margrave Frederick came to their aid.
Bayreuth experienced its Golden Age during the reign (1735–1763) of MargraveFrederick and MargravineWilhelmina ofBayreuth, the favourite sister ofFrederick the Great. During this time, under the direction of court architects, Joseph Saint-Pierre andCarl von Gontard, numerous courtly buildings and attractions were created: theMargravial Opera House with its richly furnished baroque theatre (1744–1748), the New 'Castle' and Sun Temple (1749–1753) at the Hermitage, the New Palace with its courtyard garden (1754 ff) to replace the Old Palace which had burned down through the carelessness of the margrave, and the magnificent row of buildings in today'sFriedrichstraße. There was even a unique version of therococo architectural style, the so-called Bayreuth Rococo which characterised the aforementioned buildings, especially their interior design.
The old, sombre gatehouses were demolished because they impeded transport and were an outmoded form of defence. The walls were built over in places. Margrave Frederick successfully kept his principality out of the wars being waged by his brother-in-law, Frederick the Great, at this time, and, as a result, brought a time of peace to the Frankish kingdom.
Friedrichstraße
1742 saw the founding of theFrederick Academy, which became a university in 1743, but was moved that same year toErlangen after serious riots because of the adverse reaction of the population. The university has remained there to the present today. From 1756 to 1763 there was also an Academy of Arts and Sciences.
Roman Catholics were given the right to set up a prayer room and Jewish families settled here again. In 1760 the synagogue was opened and in 1787 the Jewish cemetery was dedicated.
Countess Wilhelmina died in 1758, and although Margrave Frederick married again, the marriage was short-lived and without issue. After his death in 1763, many artists and craftsmen migrated to Berlin and Potsdam, to work for King Frederick the Great, because Frederick's successor, MargraveFrederick Christian had little understanding of art. He also lacked the means due to the elaborate lifestyle of his predecessor, because the buildings and the salaries of the mainly foreign artists had swallowed up a lot of money. For example, the court – which under George Frederick Charles had comprised around 140 people – had grown to about 600 employees by the end of the reign of Margrave Frederick.[6] By 1769 the principality was close to bankruptcy.
In 1769, MargraveCharles Alexander, from the Ansbach line of Frankish Hohenzollerns, followed the childless Frederick Christian, and Bayreuth was reduced to a secondary residence. Charles Alexander continued to live in Ansbach and rarely came to Bayreuth.
In 1775, the Brandenburg Pond (Brandenburger Weiher) in St.Georgen was drained.
Following the abdication of the last Margrave, Charles Alexander, from the principalities ofAnsbach andBayreuth on 2 December 1791 its territories became part of a Prussian province. The Prussian MinisterKarl August von Hardenberg took over its administration at the beginning of 1792.
The town centre still possesses the typical structure of a Bavarian street market: the settlement is grouped around a road widening into a square; the Town Hall was located in the middle. The church stood apart from it and on a small hill stood the castle. Some sixty years later the town (at that time a tiny village) became subordinate to theHohenzollern state, and when this state was divided, Bayreuth ended up in theCounty of Kulmbach.
In 1804, the authorJean Paul Richter moved fromCoburg to Bayreuth, where he lived until his death in 1825.
The rule of the Hohenzollerns over thePrincipality of Kulmbach-Bayreuth ended in 1806 after the defeat of Prussia by Napoleonic France. During the French occupation from 1806 to 1810 Bayreuth was treated as a province of the French Empire and had to pay high war contributions. It was placed under the administration of ComteCamille de Tournon, who wrote a detailed inventory of the former Principality of Bayreuth. On 30 June 1810 the French army handed over the former principality to what was now theKingdom of Bavaria, which it had bought fromNapoleon for 15 million francs. Bayreuth became the capital of the Bavarian district ofMainkreis, which later transferred into Obermainkreis and was finally renamed as the province ofUpper Franconia.
On 17 April 1870Richard Wagner visited Bayreuth, because he had read about the Margrave Opera House, whose great stage seemed fitting for his works. However, the orchestra pit could not accommodate the large number of musicians required, for example, for theRing of the Nibelung and the ambience of the auditorium seemed inappropriate for his piece.[7] So, he toyed with the idea of building his own festival hall (theFestspielhaus) in Bayreuth. The town supported him in this project and made a piece of land available to him, an undeveloped area outside the town between the railway station and Hohe Warte, theGrüner Hügel [de] ("Green Hill"). At the same time Wagner acquired a property atHofgarten to build his own house,Wahnfried. On 22 May 1872 the cornerstone for the Festival Hall was laid and, on 13 August 1876, it was officially opened (seeBayreuth Festival). Planning and construction were in the hands of the Leipzig architect,Otto Brückwald, who had already made a name for himself in the building of theatres in Leipzig and Altenburg.
In 1886, the composerFranz Liszt died in Bayreuth while visiting his daughterCosima Liszt, Wagner's widow. Both Liszt and Wagner are buried in Bayreuth; however, Wagner did not die there. Rather, he died inVenice in 1883, but his family had his body brought to Bayreuth for burial.
1920emergency money: voucher for 25 pfennigs1923 emergency money: voucher for a million marks
The new century also brought several innovations of modern technology: in 1892, the first electric street lights; in 1908 a municipal electricity station, and, in the same year, the first cinema.
In 1914–15, one section of the northern arm of the Red Main was straightened and widened after areas along the river had been flooded during a period of high water in 1909.
After theFirst World War had ended in 1918, theWorkers' and Soldiers' Council took power briefly in Bayreuth. On 17 February 1919, there was a three-day coup, the so-calledSpeckputsch, a brief interlude of excitement in the otherwise rather staid town.
In 1932, the provinces of Upper and Middle Franconia were merged andAnsbach was chosen as the seat of government. As a small compensation, Bayreuth was given the merged state insurance agency for Upper and Middle Franconia. Unlike the provincial merger, the merger of those institutions was never reversed.
A stronghold of right-wing parties since the 1920s, Bayreuth became a center ofNazi ideology. In 1933, it was made capital of the NaziGauBavarian Eastern March (Bayerische Ostmark, in 1942Gau Bayreuth). Nazi leaders often visited theWagner festival and tried to turn Bayreuth into a Nazi model town. It was one of several places in which town planning was administered directly from Berlin, due to Hitler's special interest in the town and in the festival. Hitler loved the music of Richard Wagner, and he became a close friend ofWinifred Wagner after she took over the festival. Hitler frequently attended Wagner performances in theBayreuth Festival Hall.
Bayreuth was to have received a so-calledGauforum, a combined government building and marching square built to symbolise the centre of power in the town. Bayreuth's firstGauleiter wasHans Schemm, who was also the head (Reichswalter) of theNational Socialist Teachers League, NSLB, which was located in Bayreuth. In 1937 the town was connected to the newReichsautobahn.
UnderNazi dictatorship thesynagogue of theJewish Community inMünzgasse was desecrated and looted onKristallnacht but, due to its proximity to the Opera House it was not razed. Inside the building, which is once again used by a Jewish community as a synagogue, a plaque next to theTorah ark recalls the persecution and murder of Jews in theShoah, which took the lives of at least 145 Jews in Bayreuth.[9][10]
During the Second World War, asubcamp of theFlossenbürg concentration camp was based in the town,[11] in which prisoners had to participate in physical experiments for theV-2.Wieland Wagner, the grandson of the composer,Richard Wagner, was the deputy civilian director there in late 1944 and early April 1945.[12][13] Shortly before the war's end branches of thePeople's Court (Volksgerichtshof) were to have been set up in Bayreuth.[14]
On 5, 8 and 11 April 1945 about one third of the town, including many public buildings and industrial installations were destroyed by heavy air strikes, along with 4,500 houses. 741 people were also killed. On 14 April, the U.S. Army occupied the town.
After the war Bayreuth tried to part with its ill-fated past. It became part of theAmerican Zone. The American military government set up aDP camp to accommodatedisplaced persons (DP), many of whom wereUkrainian.[15] The camp was supervised by theUNRRA.
The housing situation was very difficult at first: there were about 53,300 inhabitants in the town, many more than before the war began. This increase was primarily due to the high number of refugees and expellees. Even in 1948 more than 11,000 refugees were counted. In addition, because many homes had been destroyed due to the war, thousands of people were living in temporary shelters, even the festival restaurant next to the Festival Hall housed some 500 people.[16]
In 1945, 1,400 men were conscripted by the town council for "essential work" (clean-up work on damaged buildings and the clearing of roads). A significant number of historic buildings were demolished post-war but cultural life was soon back on track: in 1947Mozart festival weeks were held in the Opera House, from which the Franconian Festival Weeks developed. In 1949 the Festival Hall was used for the first time again and there was a gala concert with theVienna Philharmonic led byHans Knappertsbusch. In 1951, the first post-war Richard Wagner Festival took place under the leadership ofWieland andWolfgang Wagner. Wieland Wagner's fresh and non-traditional stagings "restored credibility to a theater that had been totally ruined by Nazi ideology."[17]
In 1949, Bayreuth became the seat of the government of Upper Franconia again.
In 1971, theBavarian State Parliament decided to establish theUniversity of Bayreuth and, on 3 November 1975, it opened for lectures and research. There are now about 10,000 students in the town.
In May 1972, a serious accident occurred at the folk festival in the town, when an overcrowded carriage derailed and several people were thrown out. Four died and five were injured, some seriously. At that time, it was the worst disaster on a roller coaster since the Second World War.
In 2006, Bayreuth chose its firstCSU member and mayor, the lawyer, Michael Hohl, and, in 2007, aYouth Parliament, consisting of 12 young people, aged 14–17 years, was elected for the first time. The end of October saw the opening of the long-planned bus station and its associated office building on the newly createdHohenzollernplatz.
The town is best known for its association with the composerRichard Wagner, who lived in Bayreuth from 1872 until his death in 1883. Wagner's villa, "Wahnfried", was constructed in Bayreuth under the sponsorship ofKing Ludwig II of Bavaria and was converted after World War II into a Wagner Museum. In the northern part of Bayreuth is theFestival Hall, anopera house specially constructed for and exclusively devoted to the performance of Wagner'soperas. The premieres of the final two works of Wagner'sRing Cycle ("Siegfried" and "Götterdämmerung"); the cycle as a whole; and ofParsifal took place here.
Every summer, Wagner's operas are performed at the Festspielhaus during the month-long Richard Wagner Festival, commonly known as theBayreuth Festival. The Festival draws thousands each year and has persistently been sold out since its inauguration in 1876. Currently, waiting lists for tickets can stretch for 10 years or more.
Owing to Wagner's relationship with the then unknown philosopherFriedrich Nietzsche, the first Bayreuth festival is cited as a key turning point in Nietzsche's philosophical development. Though at first an enthusiastic champion of Wagner's music, Nietzsche ultimately became hostile, viewing the festival and its revellers as symptom of cultural decay and bourgeois decadence – an event which led him to turn his eye upon the moral values esteemed by society as a whole – "Nietzsche clearly preferred to see Bayreuth fail than succeed by mirroring a society gone wrong."[19]
Climate in this area has mild differences between highs and lows, and there is adequate rainfall year-round. TheKöppen Climate Classification subtype for this climate is "Dfb" (Humid continental climate) using the 0 °C isotherm and "Cfb" (Marine West Coast Climate/Oceanic climate) using the −3 °C isotherm.
Margrave Albert Achilles, who was also Elector ofBrandenburg, presented the town of Bayreuth in December 1457 with the coat of arms that it still bears today. Two fields show the black and white coat of arms of the Hohenzollerns. The black lion on gold with a red and white border was the municipal coat of arms of the burgraves of Nuremberg. Along the two diagonals are twoReuten, small triangular shovels with a slightly bent shaft. They represent the ending-reuth in the town's name."[22]
The formerStadthalle (lit.: cityhall) did not have its own ensemble but was regularly used by theTheater Hof as well as various travelling theatres. It has been under reconstruction since 2017 and is supposed to be re-opened under the new nameFriedrichsforum in 2023.[23]
The only two theatres with their own ensemble are theStudiobühne Bayreuth and amateur dramatic society,Brandenburg Kulturstadt. The venues of theStudiobühne are the domicile of the theatre in theRöntgenstraße, the artificial ruins of theHermitage and the courtyard of piano manufacturerSteingraeber & Söhne.
The Richard Wagner Museum atWahnfried House was the residence of Richard Wagner and his family's home until 1966. Since 1976 it has been a museum with attached national archives and a research centre for the Richard Wagner Foundation in Bayreuth.
The Jean Paul Museum in the former residence of Richard Wagner's daughter, Eva Chamberlain, withautographs, first editions of works, portraits and other pictorial material.
The Franz Liszt Museum in the house whereFranz Liszt died, with about 300 photographs, scripts and printed papers from the collection of the Munich pianist, Ernst Burger, which were bought by the town of Bayreuth. In addition there is aStummklavier, made by theIbach company of Haus Wahnfried, letters and first editions of Franz Liszt. Biographic information boards, a mould of the font from Liszt's birthplaceRaiding, Austria and Liszt busts by Antonio Galli enhance the collection. Visits are accompanied by the music of Franz Liszt.
The Historical Museum in the Old Latin School onKirchplatz. On the ground floor it portrays the history and development of Bayreuth from the late Middle Ages to the 20th century with a model of the town in the year 1763. On the first floor are divisions covering the art and cultural history of Bayreuth's margravial period (17th and 18th centuries). Another division portrays arts and crafts in Bayreuth and the surrounding area with examples of faience pottery, glass products from the Fichtelgebirge and stone pottery fromCreußen. Painting, crafts, and early industrial artefacts from the Biedermeier period and the late 19th century round off a visit to the museum.
TheMuseum of Art in the Old Town Hall which contains the Helmut and Constanze Meyer Art Foundation, the Georg Tappert collection and the archives and collection of Caspar Walter Rauh. The collections contain key works from the 20th century. They also include the Little Poster Museum (formerly a museum on its own, the collection was integrated into the Museum of Art in 2012[24]) and the British American Tobacco's Historical Collection.
The German Typewriter Museum with a collection of over 400 historic typewriters from the Research and Training Centre for Shorthand and Word Processing in Bayreuth.
A branch of the Bavarian State Painting Collection was opened in the New Palace in August 2007. 80 works from Dutch and German painters of the late 17th century and 18th century are displayed.
The Archaeological Museum in the Italian Building of the New Palace was founded in 1827 by the Historic Society. Its eight exhibition rooms include artefacts such asNew Stone Age stone axes, 80 pottery jars from theHallstatt era andCeltic bronze jewellery. The discoveries on display, which all come from eastern Upper Franconia, especiallyFranconian Switzerland and the region around Bayreuth, date from theOld Stone Age to theMiddle Ages. In the experimental field there is a reconstructed loom, a rock drill and an originalSchiebemühle.
Maisel's Brewery and Cooper's Museum teaches everything about the production ofWeizen beer on a 2,400 m2 (25,833 sq ft) layout, making it the largest brewery in the world,[25][26] not least due to its collection of over 5,500 beer glasses and mugs.
The Upper Franconia Prehistory Museum portrays the history of life in Upper Franconia since the beginning of the world. Exhibitions are constantly changing; currently the life-size dinosaurs attract especial interest.
Bayreuth Football Museum (Altstadt-Kult-Museum ofSpVgg Bayreuth)
The Bayreuth of Wilhelmina Museum in the New Castle
Fire Brigade Museum
Iwalewa House, the Africa Centre of the University of Bayreuth
Johann Baptist Graser School Museum
Catacombs of the Bayreuth Aktien Brewery
Margravial state rooms and collection of Bayreuth faiences in the New Castle
Rollwenzelei with Jean Paul's study (Dichterstube)
Old Palace and castle chapel of Our Dear Lady (Altes Schloss)
Victory Tower (Siegesturm)
Spital Church (Spitalkirche)
Church of the Holy Trinity (Stadtkirche Heilig Dreifaltigkeit)
Stift church (Stiftskirche)
Birken Castle
TheGoldener Anker hotel
Baroque parks:
Hermitage Park, former seat of the margraves, outside the inner town
Castle and park ofFantaisie, inEckersdorf (vicinity of Bayreuth. 7 km (4 mi) west)
Sanspareil Park, about 30 kilometres (19 miles) west of Bayreuth
University Botanical Gardens
Old building of theKlinikum Bayreuth, now used as the "load-balancing" branch of theBundesarchiv („Lastenausgleichsarchiv Bayreuth“) mainly dealing with post-World War IILastenausgleich compensation records
In the town centre is the Court Garden (Hofgarten) of the New Palace. Near the Festival Hall is the Festival Park. On the southern edge of the town lie theEcological-Botanical Garden of the University of Bayreuth. On theKönigsallee, east of the town centre, is the relatively small Miedel Garden.
The best known park in Bayreuth is that of theEremitage (Hermitage) in the district ofSt. Johannis. With a total area of almost 50 hectares, it is the largest park in Bayreuth.
Bayreuth has been chosen to host the Bavarian Country Garden Show in 2016.[27][28] For this reason another park calledWilhelminenaue was built on the Main water meadows between the Volksfestplatz and the A9 motorway.[29][30]
The oldest surviving cemetery is the Town Cemetery (Stadtfriedhof) with a large number of gravestones of famous people. On the southern edge of the town is the Southern Cemetery (Südfriedhof) and crematorium. The districts of St. Johannis and St. Georgen have their own cemeteries. OnNürnberger Straße, in the east of the town, is a Jewish cemetery.
Over 60 clubs offer just under one hundred sports. The most successful club in the town presently is the Bayreuth Air Sports Community with its gliding team: in 2002 and 2015 the pilots won the Federal Gliding League, and they also won the IGC-World League in 2015.[31] The street hockey team of the Hurricans Bayreuth have been German runners-up three times (1998/2004/2006) and champions five times (1996/1997/2001/2005/2007). The basketball team ofMedi Bayreuth plays in theBasketball Bundesliga (division 1), the HaSpo Bayreuth handball team, the footballers ofSpVgg Bayreuth and the volleyball players ofBSV Bayreuth each play in their respective Bavarian League. The ice hockey team,EHC Bayreuth, plays in theDEL2, the second highest ice hockey league in Germany.
Bayreuth had its sporting heyday in the late 1980s and early 90s. The basketball team,Steiner Bayreuth, were twice German Cup winners (1987/1988 and 1988/1989) and in the 1988/1989 season they also won the German championship. The hockey team of Bayreuth's swimming club (SCC) was twice champions of Second Division South and also played for a year in the Hockey League. At the time that thetable tennis team of Steiner Bayreuth was also first class[32] (since 1983 2nd Division, in 1984/85, 1986/87 and 1987/88 1st Division,[33] 1988 relegated[34] and the team has played for many years in the 2nd Football Division. The table tennis players of the1. Bayreuth FC played in the 1st Division from 1994 to 1997.
In 1999 the WorldGlider Championships took place in Bayreuth.
In January, May, June, July, November and December: Young master pianists (concert series for young pianists from various music academies in the rooms of piano makers, Steingraeber & Söhne)
April: Bayreuth Easter Festival (charity concerts for children with cancer)
May: Musica Bayreuth
June: Uniopenair
June: Time for New Music
June: Bayreuth Folk Festival
July: Bayreuth Town Festival (on the first weekend in July)
October: Bayreuth Museum Night (the day before the clocks go back)
October: Since 2008 the town had awarded annually the Margravine Wilhelmina Prize of the Town of Bayreuth as part of the Bayreuth Future Forum symposium of the University of Bayreuth
Since a 2006/2007 timetable change, Bayreuth has no longer been connected to the DB's long-distance network. However, theFranken-Sachsen-Express still provides a direct connection to Dresden (since December 2007, every two hours). This service is worked byClass 612 diesel multiple units. There are alsoRegional-Express links viaLichtenfels toBamberg andWürzburg, and via Lichtenfels andKronach toSaalfeld.
The central bus station (ZOH) at theHohenzollernplatz
The town bus routes are operated by Bayreuth Transport and Public Baths (BVB) (Bayreuther Verkehrs- und Bäder GmbH). Sometimes private bus operators run services on behalf of the transport companies. The 15 routes (lines 301–315) operate from Monday to Friday at 20 or 30-minute intervals; on Saturday and Sunday the interval is extended to 30 minutes. Late evening services (from about 20 to 12 pm during the week and to 1 am at weekends), on Sunday mornings a simplified network of six lines (lines 321–326) runs buses at 30-minute intervals. Some lines then operate like an on-call taxi service. The network is star-shaped. Originally, the central station was at the market square inMaximilianstrasse. Since 27 October 2007 the Central Bus Station (ZOH) has been atHohenzollernplatz at the junction ofKanalstraße on theHohenzollernring. At this stop there are also bus stops for local buses to facilitate transfers.
In most places there is a signedcycle path network. In the centre of Bayreuth itself, cycling is fairly straightforward due to the relatively flattopography, something which encourages the use bicycles as an everyday means of transport. Because of the proximity of the 600 kilometre longMain Cycleway, Bayreuth is also a destination for many touristcycle routes. Because of the long service intervals of the Bayreuth town bus system and its long overnight pause, students use bicycles as their everyday mode of transport. Bicycles may be carried for a fee onDB Regio trains leaving Bayreuth and in the VGN's buses.[35]
The local airport supports Bayreuth's commercial aviation traffic, individual business travel, general aviation and air sports. There is no commercial service any more: In 2001, the service which used to operate three times a day from Frankfurt via Bayreuth to Hof, stopped service.
The airfield at Bindlacher Berg is also one of the most important bases for gliding in Germany. For example, the World Championships took place here in 1999. For the air sports community in Bayreuth, the airport is a departure point for glider flights taking part in the national Bundesliga competition league. The local gliding club also provides instruction in flying gliders and light aircraft. The nearest international airport isNuremberg Airport, which is located 85 km (53 mi) south of Bayreuth.
Fränkische Zeitung (FZ); formerly theBayreuther Anzeiger, renamed in October 2008 (advertising paper)
Bayreuther Sonntag (advertising paper)
Bayreuth4U (town magazine)
Bayerischer Rundfunk (North Upper Franconia correspondent office). In the 1950s/1960s Bayerische Rundfunk operated a radio station in Bayreuth onmedium wave with afrequency of 520kHz and a transmitter power of 200watts using a 60-metre high transmission mast.
Campus TV (University of Bayreuth media project in media science)
Der Tip (University of Bayreuth student paper)
Oberfränkische Wirtschaft, (trade magazine for Upper Franconia)
Radio Galaxy (local radio station for the Bavaria-wide youth radio)
Radio Mainwelle (local radio)
Schalltwerk (University of Bayreuth internet radio)
For centuries Bayreuth was also agarrison town for thePrussian Army,Royal Bavarian Army,Reichswehr,Wehrmacht,US Army, German Army (Bundeswehr) and the German Border Police (Bundesgrenzschutz). In the early 1990s, following the end of theCold War the garrison tradition of the town came to an end when theBundeswehr's Margrave Barracks (Markgrafenkaserne) and the Röhrensee Barracks (Röhrenseekaserne), used by the US Army and the BGS (Grenzschutzabteilung Süd 3), were closed.
^Mayer, Bernd and Rückel, Gert (2009).Bayreuth – Tours on Foot, Heinrichs-Verlag, Bamberg, p.5,ISBN978-3-89889-147-9.
^Stuhlfauth, Adam (1991).Fundberichte zur Vor- und Frühgeschichte im Gebiet der Fränkischen Alb in the Archives for History of Upper Franconia, 35th volume, 3rd section, Bayreuth 1991
^Frühwald (Hg.):Fränkische Städte und Burgen um 1650 based on texts and engravings by Merian, Sennfeld 1991.
^Hübschmann, E. et al. (1992).Bayreuth – umgeguckt und hinterfragt, Bumerang Verlag, Bayreuth
^Gedenkstätten für die Opfer des Nationalsozialismus. Eine Dokumentation, Vol. 1. Federal Office for Political Education, Bonn 1995,ISBN3-89331-208-0, p. 119 f.
^A list of the victims' names is found in "Denk / Steine setzen", published by the Bayreuth History Working Group (Geschichtswerkstatt Bayreuth), Bumerang Verlag, Bayreuth 2003. Bayreuth's Jews are considered to be those people who had lived for some time in Bayreuth, were born in Bayreuth or who were deported from Bayreuth.
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