© Miguel Ferraz
Facts & figures
HafenCity and its development in figures
HafenCity Hamburg is setting new standards – at least in Europe – in successful integrated urban development that takes local requirements and high expectations of urbanity and sustainability equally into consideration.
On an area of 157 ha, a lively city is taking shape, a new downtown on the waterfront with a fine-grained blend of workplaces and residential uses, education, culture and leisure, tourism and retail facilities.
Basic data
- Overall area: 157 ha of former port and industrial land
- Land area: 127 ha
- Expansion of Hamburg City area by 40%
- Proportion of public open spaces and publicly accessible private open spaces: 38%
- 10.5 km dockside promenade/3.1 km Elbe embankment
- approx. 8,000 homes (approx. 1,700–2,200 subsidized) for approx. 16,000 residents
- approx. 7,000 students
- Building density: 3.7–6.1 FSI (floor space index)
- Residential density: approx. 118/ha (land area)
- Employee density: approx. 354/ha (land area)
- 92 projects completed; 50 projects under construction or planned
- Investment volume:
- private investment – around € 10 billion
- public investment – € 3 billion, mostly financed from special assets fund from sales of plots in HafenCity
- General planning basis:
- Masterplan 2000
- Masterplan revision for eastern HafenCity 2010
- Deals through sale of land or exclusive options have been closed on around 2.0 million m² GFA
Residential uses
(indicative data)
- approx. 4,000 residential units completed (current own-source data)
- price spectrum:
- subsidized living: € 7.10/m² (first tier subsidy) and € 9.20/m² (second tier)
- housing cooperative rentals: € 9.50–14/m²
- controlled price housing: € 11.50-13/m²
- rental market: € 12–25/m²
- privately owned homes:
- from approx. € 3,500-4,500/m² (joint building ventures)
- over € 4,500–6,500/m² (developer-managed concepts)
- up to € 6,500–10,000/m² (luxury concepts), in exceptions e.g. penthouses over € 10,500/m²
- current number of residents: approx. 8,000 (current own-source data; see Statistikamt Nord, reporting year 2022: 6,950)
- increasing higher proportion of households with children (HafenCity: 26.4 %, Hamburg average: 19.0 %; (source: Statistikamt Nord, reporting year 2022)
Office and services uses
- approx. 930 companies to date including approx. 45 larger firms
- creation of up to 45,000 jobs (of which 35,000 office jobs)
- current jobs: approx. 15,000
Selected cultural institutions
- Oberhafen (creative quarter in former railroad sheds, some in use, some being modernized)
- International Maritime Museum Hamburg (private, opened 2008)
- Prototyp automobile museum (private, opened 2008)
- Elbphilharmonie Concert Hall (opened 2017)
- denk.mal Hannoverscher Bahnhof documentation center (permanent exhibiton on the deportations from 1940 to 1945, opens 2026)
Education facilities
- HCU HafenCity University (since 2014)
- KLU Kühne Logistics University (since 2010)
- MSH Medical School Hamburg (since 2010)
- International School of Management (branch; since 2010)
- Frankfurt School of Finance and Management (branch; since 2011)
- Business & Law School (branch)
- HafenCity school campus: educational establishment with Gymnasium secondary streams and community school streams incl. sports hall and kindergarden, poss. added residential (Lohsepark building opens 2026/27)
- Baakenhafen learning center: four-stream primary and children’s daycare incl. sports hall, training pool, education services (opens 2023, temporary 2021)
- Katharinen school (primary; since 2009)
- six child daycare centers operational (of which one temporary), seven more under construction or planned (total more than 1,200 spaces)
Special projects
- Traditional Ship Harbor in Sandtorhafen harbor basin (since 2008)
- Ecumenical Forum (since 2012)
- Elbe Arcades (since 2013)
- denk.mal Hannoverscher Bahnhof (memorial with three elements in and at Lohsepark, step-by-step completion since 2016)
- Lohsepark (since 2016)
- 1.6 ha Baakenpark recreational island (since 2018)
- Überseequartier: mixed-use quarter (retail, residential, hotel, entertainment, offices, cruise ship terminal, gastronomy), completed in the north, in the south completion 2024
- Elbtower: Hamburg’s tallest permanently used building (approx. 245 m, offices, hotel, audience-related uses, visitor platform at 220 m, entertainment; building start in 2021/22)
- Germany’s tallest wooden building in Elbbrücken neighborhood (65 m, 181 flats, exhibition space for Deutsche Wildtier Stiftung, offices and gastronomy, completion 2024)