168 Hours Berlin-Friedrichshain: ... NIGHT: DOSSIER 168 Hours Berlin- Friedrichshain: A Spatiotemporal Analysis

Sheraz Khan and Christine Preiser 1989, being transformed from an isolated and dreary ruin somewhere in Eastern Germany In contemporary Western cultures, people are to the capital of a reunited nation. For our generally accustomed to seeing the night as analysis, we chose a neighbourhood of a time of either rest or entertainment. In this Berlin that is one of the hot spots of Berlin’s respect, the city at night is constructed as the famous nightlife: Friedrichshain, between opposite of the day, as a time and space for a Warschauerstraße in the West (see map by carnivalesque loosening of (self-) control and Schmid in this issue), Frankfurter Allee in the daytime constraints.1 North, Ostkreuz in the East, and the rails of As such, the night comes packaged Berlin’s S-Bahn in the South. This section with conflicts. If we do not participate in of of the city provides classic examples of the night, we commonly complain about urban diversity and its conflict zones. As part nighttime revellers and the imposition of of former East Berlin, the neighbourhood their experience of the night upon our own. contains a complex and often problematized Yet cities and regions paradoxically support mix of residential zones, a high density of the revellers’ night, while cracking down on commercial and service areas, and nightlife Figure 1 those forms of nightlife that take place in venues, which equally attract locals and abandoned spaces and alternative venues.2 foreigners while burdening residents with Choices are made as to which nights are pollution, noise, and rising rents. We use granted allowances, and this choice is a this neighbourhood as a case study to political and economic one. In other words, begin our study, focusing first on revealing certain nighttime activities are privileged in the overlapping spaces of night within a the amount of space they are allowed. When single spatial unit. In doing so, we aim at these nights are privileged, they necessarily transforming the unitary discourse of the night come into conflict with other nocturnal forms towards a broader understanding of “nights.” that are normally taken for granted. As a starting point, we categorized This conflict of nights is particularly every public and private space accessible complex in Berlin. The city has gone through from the street in the neighbourhood on the massive changes since the fall of the wall in basis of four characteristics: type of space, 232 SCAPEGOAT 10 233 ... A Spatiotemporal Analysis NIGHT: PASSAGES privileging one nocturnal form: the profitable and planning professionals are focused on night. the night as an engine of consumption, One can already identify certain our maps show that there are many nights hotspots of nightlife consumption—the overlapping each other in this neighbourhood. clubbing district and the bar and café-lined The question of which night is dominant streets along the Partymeile (main drag) of provides a frame through which we can begin Simon-Dach-Straße—which appear in the to examine power relations and think critically first map but become even more apparent about relationships and privileges in a city or in the second map. These hotspots are neighbourhood. also embedded in a continuous residential urban fabric, within which all buildings NOTES host commercial activities on their ground 1 Joachim Schlör, Nights floors and residents on their upper floors. in the Big City. Paris, Berlin, London 1840-1930 (London: They are surrounded by and embedded in Reaktion Books, 1998). areas that are closed to the general public. 2 Tobias Rapp, Lost and Sound: Berlin, Techno und der Thus, we can implicitly see the overlapping Easyjetset (Frankfurt am Main: spaces of the night, where commercial and Suhrkamp, 2009). residential locations, as well as clubs and bars, occupy shared regions and times of the night. The maps show that there are at least two dominant forms of the night: the night of private homes, and the night of publically known and privately run places of consumption. Extending beyond this, we can imagine that there are several other nights that exist beyond the commercial night—illicit activities, Figure 2 but also legal ones such as fitness, flâneurie, or spending time with friends or family at means of accessing (e.g. through a door), 168 hours, spaces will appear and disappear home, all of which occupy the space-time times of accessibility (e.g. opening hours), and on the map, suggesting that they become (in) of night. Furthermore, within the space of requirements for people wishing to stay (e.g. accessible over time, and that the shape of the club mile, people occupy different nights purchasing something). The information was the city morphs and shifts markedly at night. in accordance with their roles. While the collected based on a temporal cycle of 168 The maps themselves show the revellers are generally front and centre in hours (one week). After collecting this data, neighbourhood at 7pm on a Friday evening, cultural representations and politics, the night we mapped the information to show spaces with 637 accessible spaces (fig. 1), and at 11pm represents working hours for security staff, bar that are open at certain times of the day. Every on Saturday night, with 333 accessible spaces staff, bottle collectors, and police. dot on the maps stands for an open/accessible (fig. 2). Immediately visible are the differences To conclude: the night does not exist; entrance at the given time proximate to in density and organization of accessible instead there are nights (see also Meier/ the public space on which their entrance spaces. While the city offers many bars, cafés, Henckel in this issue). As our maps show, the faces. All other places, for example private restaurants, stores, and services on a Friday status of the city as a generally accessible homes and closed shops, are not depicted evening, it closes up on Saturday night. The space changes with the passage of time. As since they are conceptually absent from the only types of places that open (instead of day cycles into night, the city concentrates city’s “accessible” space, even though they closing) are the nightclubs. Interestingly, the commercial activity into bars and clubs, and exist. Our analysis shows that while the city vast majority of accessible spaces at night yet this time is also used just as actively in as a physical entity is the same at any given are spaces of the nighttime economy. In this residents’ private spaces and homes. Both moment of the week, the type and amount of way, the city not only closes up spatially, but of these nights are visible in our maps, the accessible space is highly dependent on time also reduces the diversity and possibilities that former by the presence of visible dots and the and in a constant state of flux. Throughout the are linked to the space as a whole, instead latter by “empty” expanses. While academic 234 SCAPEGOAT 10 235