Editing Potsdamer Platz (section)

=== Controversy ===
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The whole project was subject to much controversy from the start; not everyone approved of how the district was commercialised and replanned.{{citation needed|date=December 2024}} The decision by the Berlin Senate to divide the land between just four investors – while numerous others had submitted bids – provoked scepticism. The remarkably low price Daimler-Benz paid to secure their plot prompted questions from the Berlin [[Auditor]]-General's office and the [[European Union]] in Brussels, which resulted in Daimler-Benz being billed an additional sum. There were wrangles over land-usage: although a central feature of the Daimler-Benz development is a top shopping mall – the ''Arkaden'' (Arcades), this did not form part of the plans until the Berlin Senate belatedly insisted that a shopping mall be included. Despite its undoubted success, this in turn led to what many saw as an "Americanisation" of the area, with even its private security force being kitted out in something resembling [[New York City Police Department|New York Police]] uniforms.{{cn|date=September 2022}}

Further wrangles effectively brought work on the north side of Leipziger Platz to a complete stop for several years; even now{{when|date=September 2022}} there are some "fake facades" where completed new buildings should be, while a long-running dispute over who owned the Wertheim department store site (or had claims to the revenue from its sale by the government), left another large gap in the central Berlin cityscape that is only now{{when|date=September 2022}} finally being redeveloped. This development, known as [[Leipziger Platz 12]], is a large complex with facades in three streets (Leipziger Strasse, Wilhelmstrasse and Vossstrasse) as well as Leipziger Platz itself, and when completed will contain 270 stores, 270 apartments, a hotel, a fitness centre and offices. However, this development brought about the demise (after several stays of execution), of the legendary [[Tresor (club)|Tresor nightclub]] and centre for [[techno music]]. Founded on 8 March 1991 in the basement strongrooms of the former Wertheim store's bank, these having survived the decades largely undamaged, the club finally closed on 16 April 2005 (it reopened on 24 May 2007 in a renovated power plant on Köpenicker Straße).{{cn|date=September 2022}}