56 -Port Offenbach

As industrialization progressed, the cost-effective transport of raw materials and goods via the rivers became increasingly important. Following the expansion of the Rhine-Main waterway, construction work began on a large harbor basin in 1899. This was inaugurated in 1902 and was 770 m long, 65 m wide and 2.50 m deep. In 1902, 58,400 tons of goods were handled; by 1913, this figure had risen to 335,000 tons. In the course of economic structural change and the switch to container terminals, the port of Offenbach became increasingly less important until operations were finally discontinued in the 1990s. Today, the 256,000 square meter site is home to an urban quarter whose former function is only remembered by the preserved port crane.