October 3, 2024, 4:25 pm | Read time: 3 minutes
The whole world is currently looking to Wolfsburg and VW. There is hardly a report on the emissions scandal that does not mention the Group’s headquarters at least once. In any case, Wolfsburg would not exist without the car manufacturer. Reason enough to take a closer look at the city – and a few interesting facts came to light.
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7 facts about Wolfsburg
1. Wolfsburg is one of the cities with the cleanest air in Germany
Well, you might ask, Wolfsburg, of all places. However, where VW has its headquarters, the air quality is quite good despite the emissions scandal. According to a study by the World Health Organization (WHO) based on data from 2011, the city is one of the cleanest in Germany: 18 micrograms of particles per cubic meter. Only Darmstadt, Freiburg, and Lüneburg Heath had lower values. For comparison, Essen achieved 30 micrograms of particles per cubic meter in the same year.
2. Wolfsburg was once called the “City of the KdF car near Fallersleben”
For seven years, between 1938 and the end of the Second World War in May 1945, Wolfsburg bore this inglorious name given to it by the Nazis. As the headquarters of the Volkswagen Group, the “Power of Joy” city was intended to accommodate around 90,000 to 100,000 inhabitants. Wolfsburg owes its current name to the moated castle of the same name, which was first mentioned in documents at the beginning of the 14th century.
3. There are no old building apartments in Wolfsburg
Most people associate old buildings with high ceilings, double doors, stucco, and floorboards. In Wolfsburg, however, you will look in vain for such gems of the Wilhelminian era. The reason: as mentioned above, the city was only founded in 1938 – so all the residential buildings in the city are less than 80 years old, most of them much younger, because intensive construction in Wolfsburg only began in the mid-1950s with the rapidly expanding Volkswagen plant.
4. Most foreigners in Wolfsburg come from…
…Italy! More than 5000 Italians live there, more than from any other country. This is according to the 2014 Statistical Yearbook. Poles (around 1000 inhabitants), Turks (around 600), Portuguese, and Russians (around 400) follow at a considerable distance.
5. Wolfsburg is particularly dry
What hardly anyone would expect: It rains significantly less in Wolfsburg compared to the rest of Germany. Only 532 mm of annual precipitation was measured at a climate station of the German Weather Service (DWD) – that is 111 mm less than in the state capital, Hanover, for example. The average annual precipitation in Germany as a whole is actually 789 millimeters. “Wolfsburg is, therefore, one of the drier places in the country,” confirms DWD climate expert Thomas Deutschland. This is partly due to the fact that Wolfsburg is particularly flat and is located relatively far to the east of Germany.
6. Wolfsburg is the economically strongest city in Germany
The gross domestic product per capita amounted to 108,000 euros in 2011 – making it the largest in Germany. (Source: Statistical Yearbook 2014)
7. The city’s two most popular sights have to do with VW
It’s hard to imagine Wolfsburg without Volkswagen. Even the city’s most popular attractions, according to Tripadvisor, have something to do with the car manufacturer: the Autostadt, a 28-hectare theme park that is also the “largest delivery center for new cars in the world,” and the Volkswagen Auto Museum. And these are the most popular attractions in Wolfsburg:
- Autostadt
- Volkswagen Auto Museum
- Phaeno
- Allerpark
- Wolfsburg Castle
The original version of this article was published in 2015.