What Is the Old Town of Frankfurt?

The Old Town (Altstadt in German) is a district of Frankfurt and has an eventful urban history. Depending on the context used, the term Frankfurt Old Town is used for various urban planning aspects:

• Old Town as the smallest district of the city of Frankfurt with currently around 4,200 inhabitants.
• Old Town as a place in which today reconstructed buildings, squares and ensembles are in imitated historical architectural styles, such as the Ostzeile, the Römerberg and the New Old Town.
• Old Town as a theme that describes the medieval buildings before their complete destruction in World War II.

The main square of the Old Town was and is the Römerberg, where the historic town hall of Frankfurt still stands today.

For a moment you could think it is today – but it’s not. The picture shows the Technical City Hall (Technisches Rathaus in German) of the City of Frankfurt – in 1998. The building erected in 1974 was demolished in 2010. Until it was demolished, the Technical City Hall was the only high-rise office building in the Old Town. A total of 35 houses for the New Old Town of Frankfurt were built on the vacated property by 2018.

The Financial District with its high-rise towers can be seen in the background on the left. The MAIN TOWER was under construction at the time (marked by the cranes). At the top right you can see the former telecommunications tower of the Federal Post Office, which has since been replaced by the Nextower and the Jumeirah Hotel.