Yearbook 2011
Austria. A mass grave was found in connection with construction work at an old mental hospital in Hall in Tyrol in January. Excavations later found the remains of over 200 people murdered during the Nazi era. Many showed signs of severe injuries that they believed were inflicted on the hospital. Visit ABBREVIATIONFINDER for the acronym of AUS that stands for the country of Austria.
The Finance Minister and the leader of the conservative government party ÖVP, Josef Pröll, resigned in April after suffering a blood clot in his lung. Foreign Minister Michael Spindelegger took over as party leader for the ÖVP and thus also the post of Vice Chancellor. New Minister of Finance became former Minister of the Interior Maria Fekter. The ÖVP, which ruled in a coalition with the Social Democratic SPÖ, wrestled with record low opinion figures around 20%.
According to Countryaah official site, Austria-Hungary’s last crown prince Otto von Habsburg died in July, aged 98, in his home in Germany. He received an imperial state burial in St. Stephen’s Cathedral in Vienna, which attracted some criticism because he had never had any political assignment for Austria. The young Otto fled with his family when the double monarchy collapsed after the end of the First World War. He became a deputy to the throne when his father died in 1922. Only when he gave up his claims to the throne in 1961 was he allowed to visit the country of birth. Otto von Habsburg was known as an early advocate of European integration and was a German Member of the European Parliament for two decades. According to an imperial tradition, his heart was buried separately, in a Benedictine monastery in Hungary.
A new incest case shook the country when an 80-year-old man in August was reported to have held two daughters locked up for 41 years and subjected them to rape and assault. The mother, who died three years earlier, must also have been beaten. The man was arrested since the daughters contacted the social services when he was injured on the floor for two days without being able to get up. The case brought to mind Fritzl, the man who in 2009 was sentenced to life imprisonment for having kept a daughter incarcerated for 24 years and becoming the father of seven children she gave birth to.
An Arnold Schwarzenegger museum was officially inaugurated in October in the house in the village of Thal, on the outskirts of Graz, where the bodybuilder, Hollywood star and former California governor was born in 1947. Schwarzenegger himself attended the inauguration.
Vienna
Vienna, the capital of Austria and one of the country’s states; 415 km2, 1. 8 million residents (2014). Vienna, located on the Danube in north-eastern Austria, occupies a dominant position in the country and is also an international center in many areas including rich music, theater and business life. The city is the seat of several international organizations and one of the world’s leading international congress centers.
Most of Vienna is located on the southwestern Danube of the Danube and extends west up the Wienerwald slopes. The centrally located central parts are crossed by the Danube Canal. Vienna is rich in green areas thanks to Wienerwald, Pratern and several castle and city parks. Administratively, the city is divided into 23 areas.
Vienna’s historic center was listed on the UNESCO World Heritage Site in 2001.
Business
Vienna accounts for about 30 percent of the country’s GDP and about 1/4 of employment. The service and service sectors, especially banking, credit and insurance, as well as trade and public sector activities, dominate the economy (about 3/4 of the city’s GDP). Vienna has a large proportion of the country’s employed in artistic professions and is an education center with eight universities and colleges. Tourism is also important. Industrial industries include the electronics – food, machinery, metal products, chemicals and automotive industries. The small industry is extensive and produces for example. luxury goods, crafts and special instruments. Industry declined in importance during the 1990s. However, the service sector has expanded.
Communications
Vienna is an important road and rail link. The railways are based on three main stations (Franz-Josephs Bahnhof in the north and Westbahnhof and Südbahnhof). Freeways lead out of the city in four directions. Schwechat International Airport, 18 km south-east of Vienna, does not belong to Western Europe’s major airports. Eastern and Central Europe and the Ancient Orient (Turkey, Israel and the Arab states).
Public transport is well developed with trams, buses, metro and commuter trains. The metro is the biggest traffic initiative of the last few decades. It encompasses five lines, two of which have been built on the former Stadtbahn (a high and subway from the turn of the century 1900) and three are brand new. Otherwise unusual in Central Europe is the bicycle network, which covers about 500 km. Due to the increase in the number of cars, more and more visits from neighboring countries and intensive transit traffic (Hungary / Slovakia-Germany / Italy), the car traffic situation deteriorated sharply during the 1990s.
Architecture and cityscape
Medieval Vienna had three centers: the Imperial Castle Hofburg (founded in the 13th century), Graben, which was the domain of the bourgeoisie, and the Gothic St. Stephen’s Cathedral. As the Habsburgs’ residence city, Vienna grew rapidly with numerous noble palaces and fortifications. The Baroque was a major development epoch with JB Fischer von Erlach and JL von Hildebrandt as leading architects. Among Fischer von Erlach’s works are Schönbrunn (begun 1696) and Karlskirche (started 1715); Hildebrandt was responsible for for the Belvedere castle facility (see picture Hildebrandt). The chief architect of the Biedermeer era was Josef Kornhäusel (born about 1782, died in 1860). synagogue (1826) and Schottenhof (1832).
Large apartment buildings around farms are characteristic of the narrow city center. The demolition of the fortifications and the construction of the Ringstrasse according to a plan from 1859 gave Vienna expansion space. Theophilus Hansen, Heinrich von Ferstel, Gottfried Semper and others in the 1860s and 70s designed a number of large institutions, symmetrically grouped around Hofburg.
At the turn of the 1900s, Vienna was a millionth city. Otto Wagner worked on the new city line, regulation of the river and expansion of the stone city. His innovative architecture, e. g. Postsparkasse (1904–06), was further developed by his students, among others. Jože Plečnik. Adolf Loos contributed the house of tailor-made company Goldman & Salatsch at Michaelerplatz (1909–11) to the critical intellectual environment in Vienna, as well as later Josef Frank. After the First World War, imperial Vienna was a number of large cities for Austria, and the 20th century architects have largely devoted themselves to building in the already built. The interwar period was characterized by social housing construction in large residential buildings (Karl-Marx-Hof, 1927-30).
After the Second World War, it took until the end of the 1950s before new construction began. Roland Rainer (1910–2004) worked as a city planner. Stadthalle (1958) and ORF-Zentrum (for the Austrian radio; 1973, 1983-84). From the same time, the Museum is 20th Anniversary by Karl Schwanzer (1918-75). Also interesting are Hans Hollein’s storefronts in central Vienna. Vienna’s later buildings also include the original and colorful Haus Hundertwasser (1983–85). The subway system, clearly 1982, stands out among other things. through well-designed architectural design. On the Danube’s northeastern side, the UNO-City International Center was built in 1973-79.