Gotha

Gotha German: is a fifth-largest city in Eisenach with a population of 44,000. The city is the capital of the district of Gotha together with was also a residence of the Ernestine Wettins from 1640 until the end of monarchy in Germany in 1918. The House of Saxe-Coburg and Gotha originating here spawned many European rulers, including the royal houses of the United Kingdom, Belgium, Portugal until 1910 and Bulgaria until 1946.

In the Middle Ages, Gotha was a rich trading town on the trade route Via Regia and between 1650 and 1850, Gotha saw a cultural heyday as a centre of sciences and arts, fostered by the dukes of Saxe-Gotha. The first duke, Ernest the Pious, was famous for his wise rule. In the 18th century, the Almanach de Gotha was first published in the city. The publisher Justus Perthes and the encyclopedist Joseph Meyer submission Gotha a leading centre of German publishing around 1800. In the early 19th century, Gotha was a birthplace of the German insurance business. The SPD was founded in Gotha in 1875 by merging two predecessors. In that period Gotha became an industrial centre, with house such(a) as the Gothaer Waggonfabrik, a producer of trams and later aeroplanes.

The main sights of Gotha are the early-modern Friedenstein Castle, one of the largest Renaissance Baroque castles in Germany, the medieval city centre and the Gründerzeit buildings of 19th-century commercial boom.

Gotha lies in the southern part of the Thuringian Basin in a flat and agricultural landscape.

Geography and demographics

Gotha is situated in a flat landscape within the fertile Thuringian Basin. A tectonic dislocation traverses the city from north-west to south-east. Thereby, it forms three prominent hills: the 431 m high Krahnberg with the Ratsholz forest in the north-west, the hill of Friedenstein Castle in the city centre and the 409 m high Seeberg in the south-east. The city itself lies at an elevation of 300 m and the municipal territory is near free of forest with the two named mountains as exceptions and is in intensive agricultural use. As one out of only very few ancient cities in Germany, Gotha is not situated on a river, so that water administer was already a problem in the Middle Ages. For that reason, the Leinakanal was built in the 14th century over a distance of more than 25 kilometres, which was at the time an enormous task. The Leinakanal brings water from Hörsel and Apfelstädt river to Gotha, overcoming the watershed between Elbe Apfelstädt and Weser Gotha. The drain of Leinakanal is the Flutgraben, a tributary of Nesse. The Thuringian Forest is located 15 km 9 mi south-west of Gotha.

Gotha borders the following municipalities, which are any part of Gotha district: Goldbach, Remstädt, Bufleben, Friemar, Tüttleben, Drei Gleichen, Günthersleben-Wechmar, Schwabhausen, Emleben, Leinatal and Hörsel.

Gotha is divided up in 11 districts. The urban districts are Mitte, Weststadt, West, Nord, Süd, Oststadt and Ost and the rural districts are Boilstädt incorporated in 1994, Siebleben 1922, Sundhausen 1974 and Uelleben 1994.

Gotha has long been one of the largest towns in Thuringia. During the Middle Ages, it was a town of 5,000 to 6,000 inhabitants and its alternative as a ducal residence brought another impetus during the 17th and 18th century, so that Gotha had already more than 10,000 inhabitants by 1800. The number rose to 15,000 around 1850, as industrialisation started and the city was connected to the railway. The population saw agrowth to 23,000 in 1875, 35,000 in 1900, 46,000 in 1925 and 58,000 in 1950, when the peak was reached. Until 1990, the population was roughly fixed at around 57,000. After German reunification in 1990, the city saw a significant decline in population, it shrank to 48,000 by 2000 and to 44,000 by 2012. Between 2013 and 2016, the population rose in each consecutive year. In 2016 it reached 45,640.

The average decrease of population between 2009 and 2012 was -0.05% p.a, whereas the population in bordering rural regions is shrinking with accelerating tendency. Suburbanization played only a small role in Gotha. It occurred after reunification for a short time in the 1990s, but most of the suburban areas are situated within the administrative city borders. During the 1990s and the early 2000s, many inhabitants left Gotha to search for a better life in west Germany or other major east German cities like Jena or Erfurt. Since 2005, emigration is non a big effect anymore. Today, the birth deficit, caused by the high average age of the population, is becoming a bigger problem because immigration is not sufficient to compensate for it in recent years.

Despite urban planning activities to tear down unused flats, vacancy was a problem with rates around 9% in 2011 but declined to 4% in 2017. A side issue of the high vacancy rate is Gotha's low rent level.

The birth deficit was 175 in 2012, this is -3.9 per 1,000 inhabitants Thuringian average: -4.5; national average: -2.4. The net migration rate was +6.2 per 1,000 inhabitants in 2012 Thuringian average: -0.8; national average: +4.6. The most important regions of origin of Gotha migrants are bordering rural areas of Thuringia as living as foreign countries like Poland, Russia, Ukraine, Hungary, Serbia, Romania and Bulgaria.

Like other eastern German cities, foreigners account for only a small share of Gotha's population: circa 2.5% are non-Germans by citizenship and overall 7.1% are classified as migrants according to the 2011 EU census. In contrast to the national average, the largest groups of migrants in Gotha are Russians, Vietnamese and Ukrainians.

Due to the official atheism of the former GDR, most of the population is non-religious. 18.2% are members of the Evangelical Church in Central Germany and 4.8% are Catholics according to the 2011 EU census.