Visit Copenhagen: The UN-Official Guide

With Copenhagen dominating the news of late, the International Olympic Committee Selection meeting and the United Nation Climate Control meetings, I think it’s worth providing a guide to Copenhagen.

To many people Copenhagen’s Tivoli Gardens, the world’s most famous amusement park, is the key to Denmark. There, on 20 acres (8 hectares) in the heart of the capital, is something for everyone, old, young, rich, poor, serious, frivolous. There are restaurants and snack bars, concerts by symphony orchestras and performances by jazz groups and brass bands, ballet and pantomime, flea circuses and fun rides, play­grounds, paths on which to stroll under shady trees, and places to sit amid beautiful flowerbeds.

From May to mid-September thousands of Danes and visitors “tivolate”—as one happy visitor explained—in an atmosphere that is a mixture of lightness, color, and gaiety combined with orderliness, good taste, and superb organization. At night Tivoli be­comes a fairyland of twinkling lights and floodlit waters. Twice a week before closing time there is a display of fireworks that ends when the huge bell in the nearby City Hall tower strikes midnight.

About one fourth of the Danes live in Copenhagen and its suburbs. The city was founded in 1167 by Bishop Absalon on the east shore of Zealand across 0resund from Sweden. Its name means “merchant’s har­bor,” and since its founding, Copenhagen has been the center of Danish life, although it did not become the capital until 1445. It is a windswept city of slender, pointed spires, copper-green roofs, and domes topped with gold balls, coronets, and clocks; of old and new buildings on nar­row streets; and of a sparkling harbor alive with ships being built, being loaded and unloaded, and under sail.

Much of the character of Copenhagen was set by King Christian IV (1577-1648), who planned and built much of the city. Not only did he plan the unique Stock Exchange {B0rsen) building, but while it was being erected, it is said, he himself worked on its strange spire, which is formed by the entwined tails of four copper dragons that appear to be standing on their heads. It is the world’s oldest market exchange building in con­tinuous use.

Christian also built churches, the Rosenborg Castle, which is now a great museum, and the Nyboder, a group of houses for men of the Royal Navy and their families, often called the first public housing project. Four succeeding kings continued building the city. About 1750 King Frederik V permitted four noblemen to build four palaces enclos­ing an octagonal plaza. These buildings, Amalienborg, are now the home of the Danish royal family.

Visitors to Copenhagen flock to the National Museum; to the Glyp-totek to see the collection of French art; and to the Thorvaldsen Museum to see the works of Denmark’s great sculptor, Bertel Thorvaldsen (1768-1844). They also stroll through many parks, including the Langelinie, where, from a large boulder at the water’s edge, a bronze statue of An­dersen’s fairy-tale Little Mermaid watches the ships come and go.

Copenhagen is a major regional center of culture, business, media, and science. In 2008 Copenhagen was ranked #4 by Financial Times-owned FDi magazine on their list of Top50 European Cities of the Future after London, Paris and Berlin. In the 2008 Worldwide Centers of Commerce Index, published by MasterCard, Copenhagen was ranked 14th in the world and 1st in Scandinavia. In the The 2008 Global Cities Index, Copenhagen was ranked 36th in the world, 15th in Europe, and 2nd in Scandinavia. Life science, information technology and shipping are important sectors and research & development plays a major role in the city’s economy. Its strategic location and excellent infrastructure with the largest airport in Scandinavia located 14 minutes by train from the city centre, has made it a regional hub and a popular location for regional headquarters as well as conventions. With around 2.7 million inhabitants within a 50 km radius, Copenhagen is one of the most densely populated areas in Northern Europe. Copenhagen region ranks 3rd in Western Europe and 1st in the Nordic countries for attracting head offices.

Copenhagen has repeatedly been recognized as one of the cities with the best quality of life and in 2008 it was singled out as the Most Liveable City in the World by international lifestyle magazine Monocle on their Top 25 Most Liveable Cities 2008 list. It is also considered one of the world’s most environmentally friendly cities with the water in the inner harbor being so clean that it can be used for swimming and 36% of all citizens commuting to work by bicycle, every day bicycling a total of 1.1 million km. Since the turn of the millennium Copenhagen has seen a strong urban and cultural development and has been described as a boom town. This is partly due to massive investments in cultural facilities as well as infrastructure and a new wave of successful designers, chefs and architects. Travellers have voted Copenhagen the cleanest city in Europe.

From its humble origins as a fishing village to its heyday as the glittering capital of the Danish Empire, to its current position as one of the world’s premier design capitals, the stories and characters of Copenhagen’s history can be discovered in its sumptuous palaces, copper-roofed town houses and atmospheric cobbled squares. From the Viking Age there was a fishing village by the name of “Havn” (harbour) at the site. Recent archeological finds indicate that by the 11th century, Copenhagen had already grown into a small town with a large estate, a church, a market, at least two wells and many smaller habitations spread over a fairly wide area.[20] Many historians believes that the town dates back to the late Viking ages and possible founded by Sweyn I Forkbeard. From the middle of the 12th century it grew in importance after coming into the possession of the Bishop Absalon, who fortified it in 1167, the year traditionally marking the foundation of Copenhagen. The excellent harbour encouraged Copenhagen’s growth until it became an important centre of commerce.

The city’s origin as a harbour and a place of commerce is reflected in its name. Its original designation, from which the contemporary Danish name is derived, was Køpmannæhafn, “merchants’ harbour”. The English name for the city is derived from its Low German name, Kopenhagen. The element hafnium is also named for Copenhagen, whose Latin name is Hafnia.

It was repeatedly attacked by the Hanseatic League as the Germans took notice. In 1254, it received its charter as a city under Bishop Jakob Erlandsen. During 1658-59 it withstood a severe siege by the Swedes under Charles X and successfully repelled a major assault. In 1801 a British fleet under Admiral Parker fought a major battle, the Battle of Copenhagen, with the Danish Navy in Copenhagen harbour. It was during this battle Lord Nelson famously “put the telescope to the blind eye” in order not to see Admiral Parker’s signal to cease fire.

When a British expeditionary force bombarded Copenhagen in 1807, to gain control of the Danish Navy, the city suffered great damage and hundreds of people were killed. The reason why the devastation was so great was that Copenhagen relied on an old defence-line rendered virtually useless by the increase in shooting range available to the British. But not until the 1850s were the ramparts of the city opened to allow new housing to be built around The Lakes (Danish: Søerne) which bordered the old defence system to the west. This dramatic increase of space was long overdue, not only because the old ramparts were out of date as a defence system, but also because of bad sanitation in the old city. Before the opening, Copenhagen Center was inhabited by approximately 125,000 people, peaking in the census of 1870 (140,000); today the figure is around 25,000. In 1901, Copenhagen expanded further, incorporating communities with 40,000 people, and in the process making Frederiksberg an enclave within Copenhagen.

During World War II, Copenhagen was occupied by German troops along with the rest of the country from 9 April 1940 until 4 May 1945. In August 1943, when the government’s collaboration with the occupation forces collapsed, several ships were sunk in Copenhagen Harbour by the Royal Danish Navy to prevent them being used by the Germans. The city has grown greatly since the war, in the seventies using the so-called five-finger-plan of commuter train lines to surrounding towns and suburbs.

Since the summer 2000, the cities of Copenhagen and Malmö have been connected by a toll bridge/tunnel (Øresund Bridge), which allows both rail and road passengers to cross. As a result, Copenhagen has become the centre of a larger metropolitan area which spans both nations. The construction of the bridge has led to a large number of changes to the public transportation system and the extensive redevelopment of Amager, south of the main city.
Copenhagen is located on the eastern shore of the island of Zealand (Sjælland), partly on the island of Amager and on a number of natural and artificial islets in between the two. Copenhagen faces the Øresund to the east, the strait of water that separates Denmark from Sweden, and which connects the North Sea with the Baltic Sea. On the Swedish side of the sound directly across from Copenhagen, lies the towns of Malmö and Landskrona.Copenhagen is also a part of the Øresund region, which consists of Zealand, Lolland-Falster and Bornholm in Denmark and Scania in Sweden.

Copenhagen Municipality
Copenhagen Municipality is an administrative unit which covers the central part of the actual city of Copenhagen. It is a fairly small part of the actual city which falls within the municipality both because it covers a confined area and because the enclave of Frederiksberg is an independent municipality. Since a reform in 2006-08, Copenhagen is divided into 10 official districts (Danish: Bydele).

Official districts Other areas

* Indre By also known as ‘K’ – Christianshavn
* Østerbro
* Vesterbro/Kongens Enghave – Vesterbro – Kongens Enghave
* Nørrebro
* Valby
* Vanløse
* Brønshøj-Husum
* Bispebjerg
* Amager Øst
* Amager Vest – Sundbyvester – Vestamager
* Slotsholmen
* Frederiksstaden
* Islands Brygge
* Holmen
* Christiania (Freetown)
* Carlsberg
* Amagerbro
* Ørestad
* Nordhavnen (North Habour)
* Bellahøj
* Brønshøj
* Ryparken
* Vigerslev

The suffix -bro in the names Østerbro, Nørrebro, Vesterbro and Amagerbro should not be confused with the Danish word for bridge, which is also ‘bro’. The term is thought to be an abbreviation or short form of the Danish word brolagt meaning paved referring to the roads paved with cobblestones leading to the city’s former gates -

Greater Copenhagen
The conurbation of Copenhagen consists of several municipalities. After Copenhagen Municipality, the second largest is Frederiksberg Municipality which is an enclave inside Copenhagen Municipality. Both are contained in the larger Capital Region of Denmark, containing most of the Copenhagen metropolitan area.
Previously, the areas of Frederiksberg, Gentofte and Copenhagen municipalities have been used to define the city of Copenhagen. This definition is now obsolete. To meet statistical the needs after the latest municipal reform, taking place in the beginning of 2007, an effort has been made to work out definitions of lands (landsdele) in Denmark. A land is basically a geographical and statistical definition, and the area is not considered to be an administrative unit. The land of Copenhagen City includes the municipalities of Copenhagen, Dragør, Frederiksberg and Tårnby, with a total population of 667,228 in the beginning of 2009.

Copenhagen and Frederiksberg were two of the three last Danish municipalities not belonging to a county. On the 1st of January 2007, the municipalities lost their county privileges and became part of Copenhagen Capital Region.
Suburban Copenhagen is planned according to the Finger Plan (Danish: Fingerplanen), initiated in 1947, dividing the suburbs into five fingers.[25] The S-train lines are built according to the Finger Plan, while green wedges and highways are built in between the fingers.

Summers in Copenhagen have average high temperatures of around 21 °C (70 °F) and lows of 13 °C (55 °F), but temperatures sometimes exceed 25 °C (77 °F) and occasional heatwaves are common during the summer. Winters usually have temperatures of −2–4 °C (28–40 °F), rarely dropping below −10 °C (14 °F).

Precipitation is moderate throughout the year, and snowfall occurs mainly in December through March, but snow cover does not remain a long time.

The city’s appearance today is shaped by the key role it has played as a regional center for centuries. Copenhagen has a multitude of districts, each representing its time and with its own distinctive character, making up a dense urban fabric. Other distinctive features of Copenhagen of today is the abundance of water, the greenness and the elaborate system of bicycle paths that line almost every major street.
The oldest section of Copenhagen’s inner city is often referred to as “Middelalderbyen” (The Medieval City). However, the most distinctive district of Copenhagen is Frederiksstaden developed during the reign of Frederick V. It has Amalienborg Palace at its centre and is dominated by the dome of the Marble Church as well as a number of elegant 18th century mansions. Also part of the old inner city of Copenhagen is the small island of Slotsholmen with Christiansborg Palace and Christianshavn.

Around the historical city center lies a band of congenial residential bouroughs (Vesterbro, Inner Nørrebro, Inner Østerbro) dating mainly from late 19th century. They were built outside the old ramparts of the city when the city was finally allowed to expand beyond this barrier.

Sometimes referred to as “the City of Spires”, Copenhagen is known for its horizontal skyline, only broken by spires at churches and castles. Most characteristic is the baroque spire of Church of Our Saviour with its spiralling and narrowing external stairs that visitors can climb to the very top of the spire. Other important spires are those of Christiansborg Palace, the City Hall and the former Church of St. Nikolaj that now houses a modern art venue. A bit lower are the renaissance spires of Rosenborg Castle and the “dragon spire” of Christian IV’s former stock exchange, so named because it is shaped as the tails of four dragons twined together.

Recent years have seen a tremendous boom in modern architecture in Copenhagen both when it comes to Danish architecture and works by international architects. For a few hundred years, virtually no foreign architects had worked in Copenhagen but since the turn of the millennium the city and its immediate sourroundings have seen buildings and projects from such international star architects as Foster, Hadid, Nouvel and Liebeskind. In the same time, a number of Danish architects have achieved great success both in Copenhagen and abroad. This has led to a number of international architecture awards. Buildings in Copenhagen have won RIBA European Awards four years in a row (“Sampension” in 2005,”Kilen” in 2006,”Tietgenkollegiet” in 2007 and the Royal Playhouse in 2008). At the 2008 World Architecture Festival in Barcelona, Bjarke Ingels Group won an award for the World’s Best Residential Building 2008 for a house in Ørestad.The Forum AID Award for Best building in Scandinavia went to Copenhagen buildings both in 2006and 2008. In 2008 British design magazine Monocle named Copenhagen the World’s best design city 2008.

The boom in urban development and modern architecture means that the above mentioned horizontal skyline has seen some changes. A political majority has decided to keep the historical center free of highrises. But several areas will see or have already seen massive urban development. Ørestad is the area that until now has seen most of the development. Located near Copenhagen Airport, it currently boasts the largest mall in Scandinavia and a variety of office and residential buildings as well as an IT University and a high school. The two largest hotels in Scandinavia are currently under construction (ultimo 2008).
An ambitious regeneration project will create a new Carlsberg District at the historical premises of the Carlsberg Breweries that has terminated the production of beer in Copenhagen and moved it to Fredericia. The district will have a total of nine highrises and seeks to mix the old industrial buildings with modern architecture to create a dense, maze-like quarter with a focus on sustainability and an active urban life. A third major area of urban development also with a focus on sustanibility is Nordhavn. The Copenhagen tradition with urban development on artificial islands that was initiated with Christian IV’s construction of Christianshavn has recently been continued with the creation of Havneholmen as well as a “canal city” in the South Harbour. A district in Copenhagen with a very different take on modern architecture is that of Christiania whose many creative and idiosyncratic buildings are exponents of an “architecture without architects”.

Copenhagen is a green city with many big and small parks. King’s Garden, the garden of Rosenborg Castle, is the oldest and most visited park in Copenhagen. Its landscaping was commenced by Christian IV in 1606. Every year it sees more than 2,5 million visitors and in the summer months it is packed with sunbathers, picknickers and ballplayers. It also serves as a sculpture garden with a permanent display of sculptures as well as temporary exhibits during summer. Also located in the city centre are the Botanical Gardens particularly noted for their large complex of 19th century greenhouses donated by Carlsberg founder J. C. Jacobsen. Fælledparken is with its 58 hectars the largest park in Copenhagen. It is popular for sports and hosts a long array of annual events like a free opera concert at the opening of the opera season, other open-air concerts, carnival, Labour Day celebrations and Copenhagen Historic Grand Prix which is a race for antique cars. A historical green space in the northeastern part of the city is Kastellet which is a well-presserved renaissance citadel that now serves mainly as a park. Another popular park is the Frederiksberg Garden which is a 32 hectars romantic landscape park. It houses a large colony of very tame grey herons along with other waterfowls.

Characteristic of Copenhagen is that a number of cemeteries double as parks, though only for the more quiet activities such as sunbathing, reading and meditation.Assistens Cemetery, the burial place of Hans Christian Andersen among others, is an important green space for the district of Inner Nørrebro and a Copenhagen institution. The lesser known Vestre Kirkegaard is with its 54 hectars the largest cemetery in Denmark and offers a maze of dense groves, open lawns, winding paths, hedges, overgrown tombs, monuments, tree-lined avenues, lakes and other garden features.

It is official municipal policy in Copenhagen that all citizens by 2015 must be able to reach a park or beach on foot in less than 15 minutes. In line with this policy, several new parks are under development in areas poor in green spaces.

Copenhagen and the surrounding areas have 3 beaches with a total of approx. 8 km of sandy beaches within 30 minutes of bicycling from the city centre. This includes Amager Strandpark, which opened in 2005 and includes a 2 km long artificial island and a total of 4,6 km of beaches, located just 15 minutes by bicycle or a few minutes by metro from the city centre. The beaches are supplemented by a system of Harbour Baths along the Copenhagen waterfront. The first and most popular of these is located at Islands Brygge and has won international acclaim for its design.

Demographics
Depending on the boundaries used, the population of Copenhagen differs. Statistics Denmark uses a measure of the contiguously built-up urban area of Copenhagen, this means the number of communities included in this statistical abstract has changed several times, in the abstracts latest edition with close to 1.2 million (1,153,615 (2008)) inhabitants. This number is not a strict result of the commonly-used measuring methods of 200 meters of continuously build-up area, as there are exceptions to the general rule: The suburbs of Birkerød and Hørsholm are excluded, while all of Brøndby and parts of Ishøj and Greve are included.[citation needed] Statistics Denmark has never stated the geographical area of urban Copenhagen. However, we know it consists of Copenhagen Municipality, Frederiksberg and 16 of the 20 municipalities in the old counties Copenhagen and Roskilde, though 5 of them only partially.

Statistics Denmark has worked out definitions of so-called lands (landsdele), a definition used to meet statistical needs on a lower level than regions. From this, the land of Copenhagen city (København by) is defined by the municipalities of Copenhagen, Dragør, Frederiksberg and Tårnby, with a total population of 667,228 in the beginning of 2009.The surroundings of Copenhagen is defined by another land, Copenhagen suburban (Københavns omegn), which includes the municipalities of Albertslund, Ballerup, Brøndby, Gentofte, Gladsaxe, Glostrup, Herlev, Hvidovre, Høje-Taastrup, Ishøj, Lyngby-Taarbæk, Rødovre and Vallensbæk, and with a total population of 508,183 (January 1, 2009). This gives a total population of 1,171,709 for these two lands together. The lands of Copenhagen city and Copenhagen suburban can together be used as a definition of the metropolitan area, although perhaps a somewhat narrow one.

From 1 January 2009 the population of the 34 municipalities closest to and including the municipality of Copenhagen is 1.875.179.[53] Land area: 2,923 km². (Capital Region – Bornholm + East Zealand + Stevns) .[54] Thus, the region comprises 6.8% of the land area of Denmark, but has 34% of Denmark’s population. This gives a total of 667 inhabitants per km² or 1,660 per square mile for the region. This compares with a population density in the rest of the country of approximately 90 per km² or around 230 per square mile.

Based on a 10%-isoline (data from 2002) in which at least 10% commutes into central parts of the Copenhagen area, most of Zealand would be covered and this area has a population of about 2.3 million inhabitants.
Since the opening of the Øresund Bridge in 2000, commuting between and integration of Greater Malmö and Copenhagen have increased rapidly, and a combined statistical metropolitan area has formed. This combined metropolitan area, which has a population of 2,488,551 (2009) is expected to be officially defined by the respective statistics divisions of Denmark and Sweden in the upcoming years.

A high-ranking civil servant of the Interior Ministry, Henning Strøm, who was involved in (i.e. known as “the Father of”) a past municipal reform, which took effect on 1 April 1970, said on television, broadcast in connection with the recent Kommunalreformen (“The Municipal Reform” of 2007), that Copenhagen municipality would encompass an area with 1.5 million inhabitants, if the principles of the 1970 municipal reform were also applied on Copenhagen municipality.[56] In other words: in the rest of Denmark the city occupies only part of the municipality, but in Copenhagen the municipality of Copenhagen occupies only part of the city of Copenhagen.

Culture and recreation
Since the late 1990s, Copenhagen has undergone a transformation from a cozy Scandinavian capital to a cool metropolitan city of international scope in the league of cities like Barcelona and Amsterdam.This is due to massive investments in infrastructure as well as culture and wave of new successful Danish architects, designers and chefs.

Museums
Copenhagen has a wide array of museums of International standard. The National Museum, Nationalmuseet, is Denmark’s largest museum of Archaeology and cultural history, comprising the histories of Danish and foreign cultures alike. The National Gallery – “Statens Museum for Kunst” – is Denmark’s national art museum and contains collections dating from 12th century and all the way up to present day artists. Among artists represented in the collections are Rubens, Rembrandt, Picasso, Braque, Léger, Matisse and Emil Nolde.

Another important Copenhagen art museum is the Ny Carlsberg Glyptotek founded by second generation Carlsberg tycoon-philanthropist Carl Jacobsen and is built around his personal collections. Its main focus is classical Egyptian, Roman and Greek sculptures and other antiquities and a collection of Rodin sculptures that is the largest outside France(Glypto-, from the Greek root glyphein, to carve and theke, a storing-place). Besides its sculpture collections, the Ny Carlsberg Glyptotek also holds a comprehensive collection of paintings of impressionist and post-impressionist painters such as Monet,Renoir, Cézanne, van Gogh and Toulouse-Lautrec as well as Danish Golden Age painters.
Loiusiana is a museum of modern art situated on the coast just north of Copenhagen. It is located in the middle of a sculpture garden on a cliff overlooking Øresund. The museum is included in the Patricia Schultz book 1,000 Places to See Before You Die. The Danish Museum of Art & Design is housed in the 18th century former Frederiks Hospital and displays Danish design as well as international design and crafts.

Other museums include:
* Thorvaldsens Museum is a single-artist museum dedicated to the oeuvre of romantic Danish sculptor Bertel Thorvaldsen who lived and worked in Rome.
* Cisternerne is a small but different museum dedicated to modern glass art. It is located in some grotto-like former cisterns that come complete with Stalactites formed by the changing water levels.
* The Ordrupgaard Museum is an art museum located just north of Copenhagen in an old mansion with an extension by Iraqi-British architect Zaha Hadid. It features 19th century French and Danish art and is particularly noted for its works by Paul Gaugin.

Music and entertainment
The new Copenhagen Concert Hall opened in January 2009. It is designed by Jean Nouvel and has four halls with the main auditorium seating 1800 people. It serves as the home of the Danish National Symphony Orchestra and along with the Walt Disney Concert Hall in Los Angeles the most expensive concert hall ever built. Another important venue for classical music is the Tivoli Concert Hall located in the historical Tivoli Gardens. The Copenhagen Opera House (in Danish usually called Operaen) that opened in 2005 and is designed by Henning Larsen, is the national opera house of Denmark and among the most modern opera houses in the world. The old Royal Danish Theatre dating from 1748 still works as a supplementary opera scene. The Royal Danish Theatre is also home to the Royal Danish Ballet. Founded in 1748 along with the theatre, it is one of the oldest ballet troups in Europe. It is home to the Bournonville style of ballet.
Copenhagen has a significant jazz scene that has existed for many years. It developed when a number of American jazz musicians such as Ben Webster, Thad Jones, Richard Boone, Ernie Wilkins, Kenny Drew, Ed Thigpen, Bob Rockwell, Dexter Gordon, and others such as rock guitarist Link Wray came to live in Copenhagen during the 1960s. Every year in early July Copenhagen’s streets, squares and parks fill up with big and small jazz concerts during the Copenhagen Jazz Festival (see yearly events). The most important venue for rhythmical music in Copenhagen is Vega in Vesterbro district which has been chosen as “best concert venue in Europe” by international music magazine Live
For free entertainment one can stroll along Strøget, especially between Nytorv and Højbro Plads, which in the late afternoon and evening is a bit like an impromptu three-ring circus with musicians, magicians, jugglers and other street performers.

Sports
Copenhagen has a wide variety of sport teams. The two major football teams are Brøndby IF and FC København. Brøndby IF plays at Brøndby Stadium in Brøndby and FC København plays at Parken in Østerbro, Copenhagen. Notable Copenhagen teams playing at the second highest level in Danish football (the Danish 1st Division) include Lyngby BK, AB, HIK, Frem, Brønshøj, Fremad Amager and Skjold.

Copenhagen also has three ice hockey teams: Rødovre Mighty Bulls, Herlev Hornets and Nordsjælland Cobras.
There are a lot of handball teams in Copenhagen. FC København owns both a women’s and a men’s team, which have the same name and logo. They were formerly known as FIF. Of other clubs playing in the “highest” leagues there are; Ajax Heroes, Ydun, and
Rugby union is also played in the Danish capital with teams such as CSR-Nanok, Copenhagen Scrum, Exiles, Froggies and Rugbyklubben Speed. The Danish Australian Football League, based in Copenhagen is the largest Australian rules football competition outside of the English speaking world.

Copenhagen is also home to a number of Denmark’s 40-odd cricket clubs. Although Denmark has been an associate member of the International Cricket Council since 1966, the sport is not taught much in schools, and Danish cricket competes unfavourably with the much more widely followed sport of football for players, facilities, media attention and spectators. In 2011 Copenhagen will host the UCI Road World Championships.

Amusement parks
Copenhagen has the two oldest amusement parks in the World. World-famous Tivoli Gardens is an amusement park and pleasure garden located right in the middle of Copenhagen between the City Hall Square and the Central Station. Among its rides are the oldest still operating roller coaster and the oldest ferris wheel in the World. It also function as an open-air concert venue. It opened on August 15 1843 making it the second oldest amusement park in the world. Dyrehavsbakken (in English “the Deer Garden Hill”) is located in Klampenborg a little north of Copenhagen in a forested area known as dyrehaven. Having been made into an amusement park complete with rides, games and restaurants by Christian IV, it is the oldest surviving amusement park in the World.

Cuisine

As of 2009 Copenhagen has 13 Michelin star restaurants, which makes Copenhagen the city with most Michelin stars in Scandinavia. Copenhagen is increasingly being recognized internationally as a gourmet destination. Apart from the selection of high end restaurants, Copenhagen offers a great variety of Danish, International and ethnic restaurants and it is possible to find modest eateries with open sandwiches (called “smørrebrød”), which is the traditional and best known Danish dish for lunch. Most restaurants, though, serve international dishes. Danish pastry, another local specialty, can be sampled from the numerous bakeries found in all parts of the city.
Copenhagen has long been associated with beer. Carlsberg beer has been brewed at the brewery’s premises at the border between Vesterbro and Valby districts since 1847 and has long been almost synonymous with Danish beer production. However, recent years have seen an explosive growth in the number of microbreweries so that Denmark today has more than 100 breweries,[65] many of which are located in Copenhagen. Some like Nørrebro Bryghus also act as brewpubs where it is also possible to eat at the premises.

Media
Many Danish media corroborations are located in Copenhagen. DR, the major Danish public service broadcasting corporation collected their activities in a new headquarters, DR byen, in 2006 and 2007. Similarly has Odense based TV2 collected its Copenhagen activities in a modern media house in the South Harbour. [66] The two national daily newspapers Politiken and Berlingske Tidende and the two tabloids Ekstra Bladet and B.T. are based in Copenhagen. Other important media corporations include Aller Press which is the largest publisher of weekly and monthly magazines in Scandinavia, the Egmont media group and Gyldendal, the largest Danish publisher of books.
Copenhagen also has a sizable movie and television industry. Filmbyen, The Movie City, which is located in a former military camp in the suburg of Hvidovre and houses several movie companies and studio studios. Among the movie companies are Zentropa co-owned by Danish movie director Lars von Trier who is behind several international movie productions as well as a founding force behind the Dogma Movement.

Annual events

* Copenhagen Fashion Week takes place every year in February and August. It is the largest fashion event in Northern Europe.
* Copenhagen Carnival takes place every year since 1982 during the Whitsun Holiday in Fælledparken and around the city. 120 bands, 2000 dancers and 100,000 spectators participate.
* Copenhagen Distortion is a youth culture festival capturing the zeitgeist of the city, gathering every year (5 days up to the first weekend of June) up to 30.000 people in the streets, in shops, galleries, clubs, bars, in boats and buses, with a cultural focus on street culture, art and upfront dance music.
* Roskilde Festival is a music festival held every year in Roskilde west of Copenhagen. Gathering around 100,000 people every year, it is one of the four largest rock music festivals in Europe.
* Copenhagen Jazz Festival, which begins on the first Friday in July, is a popular annual event that is the result of Copenhagen’s significant jazz scene. The festival takes place throughout the city in streets, squares and parks as well as in cafés and concert halls. It embraces around 900 concerts, 100 venues and over 200,000 guests from Denmark and around the world. It is recognized as one of the leading jazz festivals in the World.
* Copenhagen Pride is a gay pride festival taking place every year in August. Among the events is “Tivoli goes pink” and it ends with a parade.
* Round Christiansborg Open Water Swim Race is a 10 km open water swimming competition taking place each year in late August. There is a competition for amateurs in the morning and a FINA World Cup competition in the afternoon.
* Copenhagen Cooking takes place in August every year and is a food festival with a wide array of events all over the city.
* CPH:PIX is Copenhagen’s international feature film festival, established in 2009 as a fusion of the 20-year-old Natfilm festival and the 4-year-old CIFF. The CPH:PIX festival takes place in mid-April.
* CPH:DOX is Copenhagen’s international documentary film festival, every year in November. On top of its documentary film programme of over 100 films, CPH:DOX includes a wide event programme with dozens of events, concerts, exhibitions and parties all over town.

Copenhagen is a major regional center of culture, business, journalism, media, and science. In 2008 Copenhagen was ranked #4 by Financial Times-owned FDi magazine on their list of Top50 European Cities of the Future after London, Paris and Berlin. In the 2008 Worldwide Centers of Commerce Index, published by MasterCard, Copenhagen was ranked 14th in the world and 1st in Scandinavia. Life science, information technology and shipping are important sectors and research & development plays a major role in the city’s economy. Its strategic location and excellent infrastructure with the largest airport in Scandinavia located 14 minutes by train from the city centre, has made it a regional hub and a popular location for regional headquarters as well as conventions.

Copenhagen has placed well in a number of international rankings, some of which are mentioned below.
* It was ranked #1 as Most Livable City in the World by international lifestyle magazine Monocle on their Top 25 Most Livable Cities 2008 list
* World’s Best Design City 2008 also by Monocle.
* Copenhagen ranked #4 by Financial Times-owned FDi magazine on their list of Top50 European Cities of the Future after London, Paris and Berlin. In 2006/07 FDi Magazine named Copenhagen Scandinavian City of the Future and in 2004/05 Copenhagen was named Northern European City of the Future ahead of other   cities from Scandinavia, UK, Ireland and Benelux.
* In the 2008 Worldwide Centers of Commerce Index, published by MasterCard, Copenhagen was ranked 14th in the world and 1st in Scandinavia.
* Copenhagen #1 out of 254 locations in the Location Ranking Survey performed by ECA International that has asked European experts where they prefer to be stationed worldwide.
* It was ranked #6 in Grist Magazine’s “15 Green Cities” list in 2007 making Copenhagen the greenest capital of Scandinavia according to Grist Magazine.
* It is the capital in the world where organic food has the largest market share. One in every ten purchases is organic in Copenhagen.
* The Copenhagen Metro has been named the Best Metro in the World by industry experts.
* It is the world’s #7 most expensive city and #3 most expensive in Europe on the Forbes List.
* It is ranked #7 as Preferred City For Investment Projects.
* It ranked 3rd in Western Europe in terms of attracting regional headquarters and distribution centers, only surpassed by London and Paris.
* It ranks #1 in the Global Earning Ranking.
* The city ranks as the 5th most popular city in the world for international meetings and conferences.
* It ranks as one of the most attractive cities to live and work in Europe.
* It is ranked 11th in Mercer’s Quality of Living global city rankings 2009.
* Lonely Planet ranks Copenhagen as Scandinavia’s ‘ coolest ‘ capital .

podcast Related Posts

• Visit Denmark: The UN-Official Guide [/caption] Denmark Located in northern Europe, Denmark is bordered by the North Sea, the Baltic Sea, and Germany, which is...
• Visit Japan: The UN-Official Guide [/caption] Introduction to Japan For a country that lived in self-imposed isolation until 150 years ago, Japan has not hesitated...
• Top 10 Defining Moments of the 2000s [/caption] Having reached the end of the first decade of the new millennium, it’s time to look back at all...

Related Websites

• The Difference Between Satellite Phones & Cell Phones When discussing about satellites phones, of course many of us are aware of the technology especially those who already subscribe...
• Ten Tips For Making Internet Phone Calls (Voip) More than 1.8 million people are currently taking advantage of the benefits of Voice over Internet Protocol (VoIP) in the...
• Today in Sports History-Mar. 7 1921 - Cy Denneny (Ottawa Senators) scored six goals against the Hamilton Tigers. 1939 - The Boston Bruins won the...