Linz tourist information

The main street "Landstrasse" leads from the "Blumauerplatz" to the main square. In the middle of this square the high "Pestsäule" ("plague column", also known as "Dreifaltigkeitssäule" (Dreifaltigkeit means Holy Trinity)) was built to remember the people who died in the plague epidemics. [Plague Column:,]

Near the castle, which is located on the same site as the old Roman fortress Lentia was once built — and also being the former seat of Friedrich the III — the oldest Austrian church is located: Sankt/Saint Martins church. It was built during early medieval carolingian times.

Other sights include:

* St. Mary's Cathedral (Mariendom), Roman Catholic * Pöstlingberg-Kirche [Kirche:] * Brucknerhaus — the concert hall named after the composer Anton Bruckner, who was born in "Ansfelden", a small town next to Linz [Brucknerhaus:] * Gugl Stadium, is home to the LASK (Linzer Athletik Sport Klub), which is claimed to be the third-oldest soccer club in Austria.

The composer Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart wrote his Symphony No. 36 (1783) in Linz for a concert to be given there, and the work is known today as the Linz Symphony. The first version of Anton Bruckner's Symphony No. 1 in C minor is known as the Linz version.

The city is now home to a vibrant music and arts scene that is well-funded by the city and the state of Upper Austria.

Ars Electronica Center on the north bank of the Danube (in the Urfahr district), across the river from the Hauptplatz (main square), which leads to the historical part of the city (Altstadt), is home to one of the few public 3D CAVEs in Europe. (The very first 3D CAVE world-wide that was publicly accessible) and attracts a large gathering of technologically-oriented artists every year for the Ars Electronica Festival.

Recently built (2003) was the new modern art gallery called "Lentos". It is situated on the banks of the river Danube. The building can be illuminated at night from the inside with blue, pink, red, and violet, due to its glass casing.

The Brucknerhaus, the most important Linz concert hall, named after Anton Bruckner, is situated just some 200 meters away from the "Lentos". It is home to the "Bruckner Orchestra", and is frequently used for concerts, as well as Balls and other events.

Between the "Lentos" and the "Brucknerhaus", is the "Donaulände", which is also referred to as "Kulturmeile" ("culture mile"). This is a park alongside the river, which is used mainly by young people to relax and meet in summer. It is also used for the Ars Electronica Festival and the "Linz Fest".

Along with the Lithuanian capital Vilnius, Linz will be the European Capital of Culture in 2009.

The city was founded by the Romans, the Linza who called it Lentia, but there was already a Celtic settlement called Lentos; probably their word for the winding of a river.

The city was - for most of that time - only a provincial and local government city of the Holy Roman Empire, but it was also an important trading point connecting several routes, on either side of the river Danube from the East to the West and Czechoslovakia and Poland from north to the Balkans and Italy to the south.

Being the city where the Habsburg Emperor Friedrich III spent his last years, it was, for a short period of time, the most important city in the empire. It lost its status to Vienna and Prague, after the death of the Emperor in 1493.

Another important inhabitant of the city was Johannes Kepler, who spent several years of his life in the city studying mathematics. He discovered, on May 15, 1618, the distance-cubed-over-time-squared — or 'third' — law of planetary motion. He first made the discovery on March 8, but rejected the idea at first, only to later accept its worth. Kepler is the namesake of the local public university, the only one in Austria that embraces the campus system.

Another honoured citizen of the city was Anton Bruckner, who spent the years between 1855-1868 working as a local composer and church organist in the city. The local concert hall and a local private music and arts university are named after him.

The parents of Adolf Hitler are buried near Linz, in the town of Leonding. He was enrolled in the same Linz school as the philosopher Ludwig Wittgenstein.

Shortly before, and during World War II, Linz grew to become a major industrial area; manufacturing chemicals and steel for the Nazi war machine. Many factories were dismantled in the newly-acquired Czechoslovakia, and then reassembled in Linz. Hitler had extensive architectural plans for Linz. He regarded it as his home town and wanted to turn it into the main cultural centre of the Third Reich.

The Mauthausen-Gusen camps, the last Nazi concentration camps to be liberated, are located near Linz, with the main camp in Mauthausen just 25 kilometres away.

After the war, the river Danube that runs around Linz — from the eastern side to the northern side - which separates the Urfahr district in the north from the rest of Linz - served as the border between the American and Russian occupation troops. The Nibelungen bridge that spans the Danube river from the Hauptlatz/Main Square was then Linz´s version of Checkpoint Charlie.