Hamburg Messe und Congress – central city position, and yet in parkland location
July 2008
Hamburg is Germany’s second largest city, and at the same time one of the cities with the most water and the most green spaces. Hamburg is well known throughout the world for its maritime activities with Europe’s second largest port; and for the Reeperbahn nightlife and entertainment district. And Hamburg is also well known for trade fairs and conferences. Each year the Hamburg Trade Fair is the venue for 40 trade fairs, exhibitions and other events, attracting more than 12,000 exhibitors and about one million visitors from all parts of the world. Just a few minutes walk from the Fair site, through a park, is the CCH-Congress Center Hamburg, one of Europe’s largest and most modern conference centres. Each year it is the venue for some 350 conferences, cultural and social events, with a total of about 400,000 guests.
HMC (Hamburg Messe und Congress GmbH) is responsible for both the Trade Fair activities and the CCH. It has a clear profile, focusing mainly on the industry clusters which are also given highest priority by the City of Hamburg. They include the maritime industry, aviation, medicine/life science, new energies, science/research, and hotels and restaurants. Its portfolio ranges from leading international fairs such as the SMM, the world’s leading maritime industries fair; the INTERNORGA, Europe’s leading specialist fair for hotels and restaurants; and big exhibitions with more than 100,000 visitors such as hanseboot, the Hamburg International Boat Show.
HMC is currently enhancing its infrastructure in order to remain competitive and to build still further on its thematic profile. The new exhibition hall and the adjacent conference area at CCH were already completed in 2006, and the work on the Hamburg Fair site is scheduled for completion by the beginning of 2009, with a new exhibition area right in the heart of Hamburg – giving 30 per cent more exhibition space. Together with the expanded areas of the CCH, HMC will then have a total of more than 103,000 square metres of exhibition space – that is 87,000 square metres in exhibition halls, 6000 square metres in the open air at the Fair site, and 10,000 square metres of exhibition space at the CCH. The New Hamburg Fair site has eleven exhibition halls with 40 seminar rooms, and the CCH has 23 fully air-conditioned halls, capable of flexible partitioning, seating a total of 12,500 people. The roof of the big multi-function 7,000 square metre hall of the CCH features Europe’s biggest shrub roof garden, with a total of 40,000 plants. CCH visitors can access the garden directly from the foyers, and enjoy the view over the surrounding parkland.
Alongside the new infrastructure, HMC benefits from a unique location. Although surrounded by green spaces, it is only a few hundred metres from the vibrant city centre with shopping facilities, hotels, theatres and restaurants. The transport facilities are also outstanding – the neighbouring main-line station Dammtor, which won an award as Germany’s most attractive train station, is just a few steps away, and the airport is only twenty minutes away. A study comparing the eleven leading trade fair and conference cities in Germany showed that Hamburg is the trade fair and conference cities which keep things closest together for visitors.
