Trondheim

Trondheim ([^tr̂にn(h)æ (?·i)), formerly Nidaros and Trondhjem) is a city and municipality of Norway, capital of the province of Trøndelag. With a population of 198 219 (2019), it is the third most populous city in Norway, behind Oslo and Bergen. The municipality has an extension of 342,27 km2. The metropolitan area of Trondheim includes seven municipalities and around 260 000 inhabitants, the fourth urban agglomeration of the country.

The city of Trondheim was established as a municipality on January 1, 1838. The rural municipalities of Byneset, Leinstrand, Strinda, and Tiller were merged with Trondheim on January 1, 1964.

It was founded in the late X century as a trading hub. During the Middle Ages it was briefly the capital of Norway and the country's archiepiscopal seat. Its subsequent growth was basically supported by trade, but the city suffered repeated crises due to devastating fires. Among its heritage, the Nidaros Cathedral stands out, a masterpiece of Gothic architecture in the Nordic countries. It is also worth noting its importance as an educational and cultural center, as it is the headquarters of the Norwegian University of Science and Technology (one of the largest educational institutions in the country), and various cultural festivals.

Etymology

The Nid River (Nidelva) gave the city its first name: Nidaros.

The first name of the city was Nidaros, (that is, "the mouth of the [river] Nid") (Niðarós in Old Norse). Once, the etymology of the Nid river is discussed, and it is suggested that it means "the one that runs down", "shining", "thunderous", among other hypotheses. Nidaros was used as the official name until the 16th century, when the archbishopric disappeared. The name fell into disuse since the 16th century and its only references remained in the cathedral, known as the cathedral of Nidaros, and in the diocese of the Church of Norway.

The name Trondheim (Old Norse Þróndheimr) means roughly "healthy growing home" and by extension "prosperous place". the entire region bathed by the Trondheim Fjord, i.e. all of present-day Trøndelag. In Rome the city also came to be known as Trundum for a brief period in the XII. From the end of the Middle Ages, together with Nidaros, the name Kaupangen i Trondheimen ("commercial site in Trondheim [Trøndelag]&# 34;), and simply Trondheim as a short form. During the union with Denmark, the only name for the city was the Danish form Trondhjem.

Following a nationalist trend, in 1930 the Norwegian government recovered the medieval name of Nidaros as an official place name, but contrary to what happened in Oslo (a name that replaced that of Christianity), the population and the government of the city had been inclined, in a plebiscite in 1928, to keep the name of Trondhjem, and after popular protests the Storting (Norwegian parliament) enacted a law enacted on March 6, 1931 that recognized the name Trondheim as official, a form considered more Norwegian than Trondhjem. The latter form is still used in the names of some companies and institutions.

In Southern Sami, the town is known as Tråante.

History

Olaf Tryggvason, founder of the city.

The Cathedral of Nidaros was the sanctuary of San Olaf and the only archbishop of Norway. Its importance made Trondheim the religious capital of Norway during the Middle Ages.

Panoramic Trondheim from Bakklandet, the oldest image in the city. Recorded by Jacob Maschius of ca. 1600. In the foreground, the commercial warehouses of the river, and in a red circle, the church of Our Lady.

Originally the land was called Þróndheimr in Old Norse and was part of the kingdom of Trøndelag, although it never had kings and was ruled by the powerful jarls of Lade in the Viking Age. Trondheim as a city was founded by the Viking king Olaf Tryggvason, with the name of Nidaros, in the year 997. However, there are archaeological investigations that show that on the coast, at the mouth of the river, there was a previous population center, possibly For commercial purposes. According to tradition, Olaf Tryggvason established his residence near the mouth of the river, and on the same royal grounds, King Olaf the Saint built a church dedicated to Saint Clement, the patron saint of sailors. In principle, Nidaros was the residence of the king, and therefore, for a time, the capital of Norway.

In the first half of the XI century the city grew, occupying the peninsula that forms between the coast and the river. The main street ran from north to south, and the Elgeseter Bridge was built at this time, connecting the peninsula to the rest of the mainland to the south. King Olaf the Holy was entombed at Nidaros, and a small stone church was built on the site of his tomb around 1070, which would eventually become the cathedral. In the Middle Ages, Trondheim was the scene of several battles, including the Battle of Kalvskinnet between King Sverre and Erling Skakke in 1179.

The first fire was recorded in 1219, and in 1295 most of the city was reduced to ashes. The Early Middle Ages were a time of growth, especially after the city was made the archiepiscopal seat in 1152. At the end of the 13th century there were about 20 churches and on the periphery the monasteries of Elgeseter, Bakke and Munkholmen had risen.

At the end of the Middle Ages there was a stagnation in population growth and the fires of 1481 and especially that of 1532 marked the beginning of a phase of decline. The last archbishop of Norway, Olav Engelbrektsson, tried to stop Danish influence in the country. In response, in 1531 Danish troops burned down the archiepiscopal palace, the cathedral and a good part of the city. With the Protestant Reformation of 1537 Nidaros lost its status as the ecclesiastical center of Norway.

Increased trade in the 17th century benefited Trondheim, and the first suburb outside its historic limits was Bakklandet, on the eastern bank of the Nidelva. The city was strongly influenced by foreign merchant families, especially those from Flensburg, then a Danish city. In 1658, the city was besieged by Swedish troops and by the Treaty of Roskilde, Trondheim and all of Trøndelag belonged to Sweden between 1658 and 1660.

The city survived the fires of 1599 and 1651, after which the streets were laid out with greater width, but this did not prevent it from being devastated again by the great fire of 1681, which almost completely devastated Trondheim. King Christian V ordered the design of a new urban plan, which would be in charge of the Luxembourger Johan Caspar von Cicignon.

La Munkegata, one of the wide streets that emerged with the urban plan of Johan Caspar von Cicignon in the centuryXVIIwhich sought to minimize the spread of fires. Photograph by Axel Lindhal at the end of the centuryXIX. To the left, the Stiftsgården, and to the bottom, the cathedral.

Cicignon's plan consisted of an orthogonal road network with five wide streets running north-south and five east-west, without regard to property rights, in order to prevent subsequent fires, which at the same time Time gave the sleepy little town a more "attractive" air to would-be immigrants. During this time, Trondheim had about 8,000 inhabitants.

In the east a northeast-southwest direction was established. Two main streets were established, Kjøpmannsgata ("merchant's street"), on the west bank of the Nidelva, and Munkegata ("monk's street"), which runs from the cathedral towards the islet of Munkholmen. The main square was designed in the middle of the Munkegata. Cicignon considered fire protection and military defense above all, and tried to do away with the medieval lanes and alleyways (known in Trondheim as veit), but several of these still survive today. Fortifications were established to the north, south and west. The Kristiansten fortress and the Old Bridge date from this period.

In the 18th century Trondheim's second suburb, Ila, was founded in the west. At the beginning of the century there was a new fire that destroyed the buildings between Munkegata and Kjøpmannsgata, but the latter served as a barrier so that the fire did not reach the warehouses on the river bank, which represented a relief for the merchants. Between 1760 and 1810 there was intense construction activity in the central area, and most of the city's wooden palaces date from this period.

There were three more fires in the 1840s: two large ones in 1841 and 1842 and one smaller one in 1844. After the fires, the authorities took some initiatives for wooden buildings: houses had to be two-story, with a flat roof and without an attic or other construction on the roof. The ground floor was set up for shops, while the upper floor served as a home. Most of the wooden houses that have survived to the present day in the center of Trondheim date from the beginning of that decade. However, in 1845 a new law was passed that made masonry construction mandatory.

Map of Trondheim of 1898.

Until then, administratively, Trondheim only consisted of the peninsula where the center sits. In 1847, the suburbs of Bakklandet and Ila (until then part of the hundred Strinda) were included in Trondheim, and in 1864 it was the turn of Elgeseter, Øya and Rosenborg. In the 1860s, the engineer Carl Adolf Dahl built the first drinking water and sanitation networks. In 1864 the city was connected by rail with Støren (Midtre Gauldal municipality), in 1877 with Christiania and in 1882 with Storlien, Sweden. The new port facilities in 1882 contributed to a notable improvement in the city's communications with the outside world.

In 1893 the towns of Singsaker, Øvre Rosenborg, Lademoen and a part of Byåsen were incorporated as neighborhoods. The fire-fighting building law, only in force for the city center, was extended to the entire municipality after a fire in Rosenborg in 1899, but a few years later wooden construction was allowed again in some parts.

The great growth of the beginning of the XX century made urban regulation of the entire municipality necessary, and a new urban plan in 1913, which regionalized the territory according to land use.

During World War II, Trondheim was occupied by Nazi Germany from April 9, 1940, the first day of the country's invasion, until May 8, 1945. In this city the capitulation of the Norwegian armed forces.

In 1952 Byåsen and the Lade peninsula were incorporated into Trondheim. The growth of the city continued in the following years and on January 1, 1964 Trondheim, Strinda, Tiller, Leinstrand and Byneset were merged into one large municipality, defining Trondheim's current boundaries. In recent decades, urban growth has spread to several of the formerly rural areas, where residential areas have been built due to the lack of housing in the historic center.

Symbols

One of the symbols of the municipality of Trondheim is the coat of arms with a bishop and a king, topped with a mural crown. It is an 1897 design based on a medieval seal of the city, from the times of the Catholic archbishopric.

Trondheim is one of the few Norwegian municipalities with its own flag that has nothing to do with its coat of arms. Its ensign is a red flag with a yellow wild rose in the center (the colors of the Norwegian national coat of arms) in a design known as the "Rose of Trondheim" or "Rose of St. Olaf", from the identification of the symbol with the patron saint of Norway. the city.

Demographics

Figure of the demographic evolution of Trondheim between 1951 and 2020
Source: Norwegian Central Statistics Department

According to data from the Norwegian Central Department of Statistics, the municipality of Trondheim had 184,960 inhabitants on January 1, 2015. The high number of students (about one-sixth of the total population) makes the number of inhabitants of the city is greater in fact.

The foreign population in Trondheim reached 11,474 people in 2006, which represented 7.2% of the total population of the municipality (slightly below the national average, 8.3%). The foreign population comes from 148 different countries and the majority (39.8%) from Asian countries. The origin of the immigrant population by country corresponds first to Turkey (mainly of the Kurdish ethnic group), followed by Vietnam, Sweden, Iran and Iraq.

Trondheim's population is increasing year by year, and has experienced considerable growth since the second half of the 19th century. Growth has been relatively moderate since the second half of the XX century, not taking into account the 1964 merger with other municipalities, which resulted in an increase of close to 100% over the previous year. The annual growth rate in the last 10 years tends to increase, and the period 2007-2009 saw the largest annual increases since at least 1950: more than 3000 inhabitants.

The majority religion is the Church of Norway. This Lutheran institution maintains one of its 11 dioceses in the city, to which 20 parishes in the municipality belong, and its seat is the Nidaros Cathedral. Other small religious communities include the Catholic Church, which has a prelature and cathedral; the Mormon community, the Muslim community, and a small but historically significant Jewish community, among others.

Metropolitan area

The metropolitan area of Trondheim, known as Stor-Trondheim ("Greater Trondheim"), is defined as such by the Norwegian Department of Statistics. It includes 7 municipalities and its population is close to 260,000, of which the municipality of Trondheim contributes approximately 70%. It is the fourth largest metropolitan area in Norway, after Oslo, Bergen and Stavanger.

In addition to the central city, the rest of the municipalities include small nearby towns more or less economically related to Trondheim. As part of the integration of this metropolitan area, the ports of Trondheim, Orkdal and Stjordal function in a coordinated manner under the same administration. The metropolitan area airport is located in the city of Stjørdalshalsen.

Geography and climate

Panoramic view of Trondheim in the winter.

The city of Trondheim is situated where the River Nidelva (“River Nid”) meets the Trondheimsfjorden. The highest elevation of the city is the Storheia hill, with 565 meters above sea level. On the summer solstice the sun rises at 03:00 and sets at 23:40, but remains just above the horizon - there is no darkness from May 20 to July 20. On the winter solstice the sun rises at 10:00, staying very low above the horizon, and sets at 14:30.

Trondheim mainly has an oceanic climate, but is fairly sheltered from the stronger offshore winds. The highest temperature recorded was 35 °C on July 22, 1901, and the lowest was -26.1 °C in February 1899. Trondheim experiences moderate snowfall from November to March, alternating with mild weather and rainfall. There are on average 14 days in winter with a layer of at least 25 centimeters of snow on the ground and 22 days with a minimum temperature of -10 °C or lower. There is often much more snowfall in surrounding, higher altitude areas such as Byåsen and Heimdal, with good skiing conditions in Bymarka. Spring is often quite sunny, but the nights are usually cool or cold. The maximum temperature during the day can exceed 20 °C from the beginning of May to the end of September and on average there are 34 days each summer with temperatures above 20 °C. October is the most typically autumnal month with low temperatures and falling leaves from the trees, while November is much darker and colder. The average annual precipitation is 892 mm, fairly distributed throughout the year, although in September and October it rains twice as much as in March, April and May. Temperatures tend to be higher in recent years. The Trøndelag area has seen its average temperature rise by almost 2 °C in the last 25 years (2007).

Trondheim average climate parameters (1995-2013)
Month	Ene.	Feb.	Mar.	Open up.	May.	Jun.	Jul.	Ago.	Sep.	Oct.	Nov.	Dec.	Annual
Temp. max. abs. (°C)	12.0	15.0	16.0	21.4	28.0	31.2	32.5	31.3	26.0	21.0	16.1	13.1	32.5
Average temperature (°C)	0.2	1.5	4.3	8.6	13.5	16.4	19.0	18.2	14.3	8.2	4.4	0.7	9.3
Average temperature (°C)	-4.0	-2.6	0.9	2.3	7.8	11.2	14.7	13.0	9.4	4.8	1.2	-3.4	5.6
Temp. medium (°C)	-9.0	-5.8	-3.3	0.5	3.6	7.7	10.3	6.5	3.0	-0.8	-5.9	-8.2	2.3
Temp. min. abs. (°C)	-28.0	-25.0	-21.5	-14.0	-6.0	-1.1	1.6	0.1	-4.5	-12.0	-19.0	-24.0	-27.0
Total precipitation (mm)	69	70	84	46	49	78	79	82	88	79	75	71	870
Precipitation days (≥ 1 mm)	13	12	13	10	11	13	12	12	13	13	12	12	146
Hours of sun	11	65	119	159	215	197	178	176	112	62	32	9	1335
Relative humidity (%)	77.2	77.0	71.4	67.9	67.4	70.9	73.5	75.9	77.8	77.8	76.6	76.9	74.2
Source: Norwegian Meteorological Institute - eKlima

Economy

Commercial street in Trondheim.

Historically, Trondheim's economy has revolved around commerce, and today the service sector is the main economic activity. The main company in the city is Grupo Reitan, dedicated to managing wholesale and retail sales franchises. Among the franchises it manages are the REMA 1000 supermarkets, the 7-Eleven convenience stores and the YX Energi gas stations, among others. Most of its stores are located in Norway, but it also has branches in Denmark, Sweden and Latvia. Noteworthy credit institutions include Fokusbank (a branch of the Danish Danske Bank) and SpareBank 1 SMN, the largest in Central Norway. Trondheim's educational institutions, especially the Norwegian University of Science and Technology and the University College of Sør-Trøndelag are an important source of employment for the city.

Grain field in the urban area of Trondheim.

Located in a privileged area for agricultural activities, there is still the practice of agriculture in the rural parts of Trondheim. Agricultural land accounted for, in 2007, 17% of the surface of the municipality, and this was the one with the highest cereal production in Sør-Trøndelag. The main agricultural products are cereals, fodder and in third place dairy.

In Trondheim there are the companies Tine Midt Norge, a dairy company, Gilde, a meat company, and the Felleskjøpet cooperative, which sells agricultural products and animal feed. Of great tradition are a brewery and a chocolate factory.

There is also some heavy industry, transportation, electrical, and fishing industry activity.

Education and research

Norwegian University of Science and Technology.

Trondheim Cathedral School, Norway's oldest school.

There are 11 secondary schools (gymnasium); Among them, the Trondheim Cathedral School, founded in 1152, stands out as the oldest educational center in Norway.

Trondheim is home to the Norwegian University of Science and Technology (Norges Teknisk-Naturvitenskapelige Universitet, abbreviated NTNU), a national institution and the second largest in Norway, with about 20,000 students. The university has several campuses throughout the city, specializing in engineering and science; social sciences and humanities, natural sciences, marine technology, as well as the San Olaf University Hospital for medicine; the Trondheim Academy of Arts for the visual arts, and the Trondheim Conservatory for music. The University also has the largest library of engineering books in all of Norway.

Another prestigious public institution is the University College of Sør-Trøndelag (Høgskolen i Sør-Trøndelag, abbreviated HiST), with 7,000 students enrolled and six campuses. Both NTNU and HiT receive thousands of students from all over the country on a daily basis, which means that the city's population is slightly higher than the official figures.

Two other noteworthy schools are private. One of them is a campus of the prestigious IB Business School, and the other is the Queen Maud College for Early Childhood Education, the only one specializing in preschool teacher training and one of the oldest in the field, funded by the Church of Norway.

SINTEF, the largest independent research body in Scandinavia, has 1,800 employees, of whom 1,300 are located in Trondheim. The oil company Statoil has a research center. Finally, the Royal Norwegian Air Force Academy is located in Kuhaugen.

Importance of new technologies

Trondheim is one of the cities with the highest penetration of new technologies worldwide, particularly in terms of Internet access. This has been mainly promoted by the NTNU university, which was one of the first entities to connect to the Internet (in fact, this university had a class A IP address at the time).

The high level of access to new technologies, together with the tremendous number of computer engineers trained annually in the city, has led to the establishment of several companies in Trondheim, such as Google, Yahoo, Opera or Sun Microsystems.

Museums

National Museum of Decorative Arts.

Museo del Palacio del Arzobispo.

The Trondheim Art Museum has the third largest public collection of art in Norway, mainly Norwegian artwork from the last 150 years. The National Museum of Decorative Arts houses an extensive collection of the genre, as well as the only permanent exhibition in Norway of Japanese arts and crafts. The Trøndelag Folk Museum, located on the slopes of what was the Sverresborg fortress, is an open-air museum that includes about 60 buildings that account for the cultural history of the city. region. The Popular Museum also depends on the National Museum of the Deaf and the Museum of Navigation.

The Archbishop's Palace, once the residence of the Catholic archbishops of Nidaros, has an on-site museum of religious history and art, a military museum, and the Norwegian Crown Jewels showroom.

The Trondheim Science Center is an interactive science museum. The Museum of Natural History and Archaeology, founded by the Royal Norwegian Scientific Society, belongs to NTNU. There is also a variety of small museums of history, science and natural history, such as the Trondheim Maritime Museum, adjacent to the Archbishop's palace; the Ringve Museum, with its collection of musical instruments and botanical garden; the Trondheim Tram Museum, and the Jewish Museum, in the city's synagogue, one of the northernmost in the world.

There are also some private galleries of contemporary art and design.

Culture

Old Town Hall, currently a library.

Trondheim Public Library was opened in 1908 and is also the public library serving all of Sør-Trøndelag. Its main building is the old town hall and it has five branches in the city. The loan service moves approximately 1,130,000 volumes annually.

The modern Trøndelag Theatre.

Nova kinosenter.

The Trøndelag Theater is the main regional theatre, and dates back to 1816, although in 1997 it was transferred to new and modern facilities. It can host large-scale theatrical, dance and musical performances. There are other theaters in Trondheim, such as the Avant Garden and the Fusentast.

NTNU has its own dance company. There are also associations that promote folk dances, as well as independent clubs of various genres.

Trondheim's two cinemas, Prinsens kino and Nova kinosenter belong to the Trondheim Municipal Film Company (Trondheim kino), founded in 1918. Together they have 13 screens of various sizes, which can also be used for other cultural and cultural purposes. social. The company annually organizes the international festival Kosmorama, in the first half of March. The Trondheim Film Club and Cinemateket are two independent organizations that are part of the Association of Norwegian Film Clubs. The first makes use of the old Rosendal cinema, a building from the 1920s, and the second of the Nova kinosenter and the church of Our Lady.

In Trondheim there is a large musical community of rock, jazz and classical music. The latter two genres are spearheaded by the University's conservatory and the municipal music school, and the best-known showcases are the Trondheim Symphony Orchestra and the Trondheim Soloists ensemble (Trondheimsolistene). Classical artists from the city include violinists Arve Tellefsen, Elise Båtnes and Marianne Thorsen, and the Nidaros Cathedral Boys Choir. The tubist Øystein Baadsvik, with great international projection, was born and began his studies in Trondheim.

Trondheim-related pop/rock artists and bands include Åge Aleksandersen, Margaret Berger, DumDum Boys, Gåte, Keep of Kalessin, Lumsk, Motorpsycho, Kari Rueslåtten, The 3rd and the Mortal, TNT, Tre Små Kinesere, The Kids, and Malin Reitan.

The music production team Stargate had their origins in Trondheim.

Trondheim's most important festival is the Saint Olaf Festival (Olavsfestdagene), which takes place in the 10 days around July 29, Saint Olaf's Day. This celebration of patronal origins it integrates musical exhibitions of various genres and theatrical pieces that take place in the main cultural sites of the city and brings together several hundred Norwegian and international artists. There are also religious celebrations, medieval re-enactments and a trade fair.

Trondheim Student Association Building.

Other major festivals include the Trondheim Jazz Festival, held in the second week of May, and the Chamber Music Festival, at the end of September.

As about a fifth of the population are students, Trondheim is heavily influenced by student culture. In fact, the Trondheim Student Association is the largest in all of Norway. Trondheim's student culture is characterized by its long tradition of volunteering, and the association's organization involves more than 1,200 volunteers. Trondheim students also organize two major cultural festivals every two years: UKA (The Week), the largest cultural festival in Norway, and ISFiT (International Student Festival Trondheim), which with its global themes attracts representatives of dozens of countries and internationally renowned personalities to the city.

Trondheim students are members of the Trondheim Student Welfare Association, one of 25 such bodies in the country.

Sports and leisure

The Rosenborg (white and black) against Valencia, in the UEFA League match at Lerkendal Stadion (2007).

Trondheim is the home of the Rosenborg Ballklub (abbreviated RBK), a soccer team from the Rosenborg neighborhood that has won the most titles in the Norwegian Tippeligaen. It is also one of the European teams with the greatest participation in the UEFA Champions League. Their stadium is the Lerkendal Stadion. Trondheim's oldest football club, however, is FK Kvik, founded in 1900 and currently part of the third division.

Trondheim has in 2010 two clubs in the Toppserien, the highest women's soccer league: Trondheims-Ørn (Trondheim Eagles) and Kattem Idrettslag. The former is one of the most famous women's football clubs in Norway and holds the record for titles in the Toppserien.

The largest sports club in Trondheim and one of the largest in Norway is NTNUI, the university club of NTNU, with 10,000 members and more than 50 sports. Other important sports clubs are Byåsen Idrettslag and Strindheim Idrettslag, which, like Trondheims-Ørn and Kattem Idrettslag, have sports options such as football, handball and athletics, among other sports, both in the female and male categories and for various ages.

Granåsen ski jumping platform.

There is intense winter sports activity. The Trondhjems Skiklub (Trondhjem Ski Club), founded at the end of the XIX century, is the club dedicated to such activities. Cross-country ski competitions and events take place in Bymarka and the Estenstadmarka area, and ski jumping is held on the Granåsen platform; there are also downhill skiing possibilities on the Vassfjellet mountain. Trondheim hosted the 1997 Nordic World Ski Championships. In February 2004 the sprint world championships were held on the streets of the city and in 2006 the Biathlon National Championships were held here.

The Rosenborg ice hockey club plays in the First Division (the second tier), and is the successor to the once elite league champion Trondheim Black Panthers, who disappeared in 2008.

Hiking is a popular activity in the mountainous areas near the city, such as Trollheimen, Dovrefjell and Sylane. There is also a 9-hole golf course on the edge of Bymarka and another 18-hole golf course near Byneset.

Salmon fishing is also popular. The record in the Nidelva River is 31.8 kg. The Gaula River, one of the best salmon fishing rivers in Europe, flows into the Gaulosen (a branch of the Trondheim Fjord), in the municipality of Trondheim, south of the city centre.

Coffee shops in the Bakklandet district.

Trondheim offers a wide variety of restaurants and bars. There are international cuisine, Norwegian cuisine and fast food establishments, from exclusive to low cost. They are located mainly in the center and in the neighborhoods of Bakklandet and Solsiden. Terrace cafes and piano bars are also typical. The city offers many possibilities for nightlife, with live music venues and popular discos of various musical genres and urban cultures.

Monuments

The main facade of the Nidaros Cathedral.

Nidaros Cathedral

Main article: Nidaros Cathedral

The cathedral is famous for being the main temple of Norway and one of the main historical monuments of the country. It is currently a Lutheran church, but in the Middle Ages it was an important pilgrimage center for the Catholic Church, as it was the tomb of Saint Olaf, the patron saint of Norway. It is one of the largest temples in all the Nordic countries. It is built primarily in the English-inspired Gothic style, although much of the building is a reconstruction from the 19th and centuries. ="font-variant:small-caps;text-transform:lowercase">XX financed directly by the State in order to restore the dignity of the monument, which remained for centuries in a dilapidated state.

Archbishop's Palace

Main article: Archbishop of Trondheim Palace

Closely linked to the history of the cathedral is the archbishop's palace, adjacent to the first. Some parts of its structure preserve certain Romanesque characteristics. Before the reform, it was the residence of the powerful archbishops of Nidaros. Later, when Norway was united with Denmark, it was the seat of the king's representatives in the city and then the army headquarters. Today it is a historical museum and site of various cultural events.

Church of Our Lady

Main article: Church of Our Lady of Trondheim

Church of Our Lady.

In addition to the cathedral, the other medieval temple in the city is the Church of Our Lady. This is a temple dating from the beginning of the XII century and after the cathedrals of Nidaros and Stavanger, it is the largest Norwegian medieval temple. Its artistic style, Romanesque and Gothic, has been intervened on several occasions by remodeling and extensions that introduced Baroque and Neo-Gothic aspects.

Other medieval churches

Outside the historic center of the city of Trondheim, in former towns that were absorbed by the municipality, are the church of Lade, to the east of the metropolitan area, and the church of Byneset, in a rural loophole in the west of the municipality. They are two small Romanesque stone churches dating from the second half of the XII century and exhibiting a remarkable austerity typical of churches norwegian rural

Special mention should be made of the Haltdalen Stave Church, a small and simple stavkirke (stave church) dating from the 12th century. It is actually not originally from Trondheim, but from Holtålen, a municipality southeast of the city, but today it is the main attraction of the Trøndelag Folk Museum.

monumental architecture in wood

The bryggenNext to the Nidelva River.

In the center and adjacent areas, such as Bakklandet and Ila, numerous wooden buildings still survive. Several of them are palaces and mansions from the XVII and XVIII that served as homes for the city's wealthy merchants and present Baroque, Neoclassical and Empire-style motifs. Among them we can mention the Stiftsgården, currently a palace of the Norwegian royal family; the Sukkerhuset (“sugar house”), a former sugar refinery that benefited from trade with the Danish West Indies; the Tronka, an old hospital for the mentally ill; the Sommergården, currently a pharmacy; the Hornemansgården, the Weisenhuset, and the churches of Leinstrand, Bakke and the hospital, among others.

The area of the old commercial warehouses, known as bryggen ("the jetty"), on both sides of the Nidelva River, is one of the most typical places in Trondheim. They are wooden buildings partially built on the river. Today they are occupied by homes and commercial premises and are, like all of Trondheim's timber heritage, under constant threat of fire.

• 

  Stiftsgården

• 

  Sukkerhuset

• 

  Hornemansgården

• 

  Old bridge

Military architecture

In the narrowest part of the peninsula where the historic center of Trondheim is located, there were XII century since the end of the century a small wooden defensive fortification, which in the 1640s was rebuilt in stone. This fortification, called Skansen (literally, "the fort"), was the defense of the city from the west. Its remains and some cannons are still visible in what is now a park.

Munkholmen.

Sion Fortress, also known as Sverresborg, was built of stone and wood by King Sverre in 1182 to guard the city from his rivals during the era of civil wars. Dismantled since the XIII century, today only its foundations survive on the hill where this fortress stood, the oldest in the one that has news in the city.

Kristiansten's fortress.

Opposite the port, in the fjord, is a small islet called Munkholmen, with its entire area occupied by a fortification. A Benedictine monastery was founded on this island in the 12th century. With the disappearance of the monastic order during the reform, the current fortress was erected on the site, which also functioned as a prison. Today it is a recreation area.

Kristiansten Fortress owes its name to King Christian V. It was built in the second half of the 17th century on a hill to protect the city from the east. It is a fortress with bastions with a fairly well preserved keep. It was instrumental in the defense of Trondheim during the Great Northern War, in which Swedish troops invaded Norway in 1716. During World War II it was used by the Nazis as an execution site for opponents.

Finally, the Dora bunker is a Nazi construction that served as a base for German submarines during World War II.

Other monuments

Jugendkvartalet (“modernist apple”).

Several buildings in the historicist, eclectic and modernist style from the late XIX and early XX are part of the architectural and historical heritage of the city and several of them are protected by law. Among them are the main building of the Trondheim Public Library (formerly the City Hall), the National Museum of Justice, the Ringve house, the Old Bridge, or the building of the EC Dahl brewery. Other noteworthy buildings from this period include Olaf Nordhagen's Biological Data Bank Building, the Synagogue, the Seamen's Asylum, the Britannia Hotel and the Mathesongården Building. In modernism, the best examples are perhaps the house of the EC Dahl foundation, now a branch of the Norwegian government, and the block of buildings known as Jugendkvartalet (modernist block), although the church can also be mentioned de Lademoen, a large church that looks like a mix between Art Nouveau and Neo-Romanesque.

Sculpture

The column of Olaf Tryggvason, in the main square (Torget).

Urban sculpture in Trondheim attempts to honor historical figures. Thus, in public places there are statues in honor of kings, national heroes and local philanthropists, as well as sculptural monuments in honor of the fallen in World War II, which include memorials to the Jewish Holocaust. Olaf Tryggvason's column, the work of Wilhelm Rasmussen in the central square, is perhaps the best-known sculpture in the city. At its base is a sundial. Another famous sculpture is The Last Viking, by Nils Aas, which recalls Johan Bojer's novel of the same name and is located in the Ravnkloa square, next to the fjord. The statue of Leif Eriksson (1997), by August Werner, was a gift from the Norwegian community in Seattle (United States) to commemorate the thousand years since the founding of Trondheim and the Viking discovery of America.

Parks and gardens

Ringve botanical garden.

Trondheim is a city surrounded by forested areas, which make up 52% of the municipal territory. The main green areas of the city are the Bymarka and Estenstadsmarka mountainous areas, located to the west and south of the city, respectively. Both are visited by the inhabitants of Trondheim as a recreational site and constitute vast natural areas of forests, lakes and ponds.

Golf course in Bymarka.

In the urban area there are numerous small parks. Among the largest is Marinen (literally, “the marina”), just to the south of the cathedral, between it and the river. This park is so called because there was once a military port here. It is an area of meadows and trees very suitable for walks and sunbathing during the summer. In the center there are other small parks, such as Tordenskjold Park, City Hall Park, Stiftsgården Garden and Ila Park.

Stiftsgården Park.

To the south of the city, the banks of the Nidelva constitute a natural wooded area. Another park in this area is the Elgeseter park, which is connected to the park of the University College and the green areas of the University.

In the east, there are the green areas of Duedalen and Småbergan (this is a hill where the Kristiansten fortress is located); Lademoen Park and the Ringve Botanical Garden. The Ladestien area is a 14 km strip of natural vegetation adjacent to the fjord.

Media

Old headquarters AdresseavisenIn the center of Trondheim.

Trondheim is the communications center of the Central Norwegian region. The two dominant companies in the city are two: the Adresseavisen conglomerate, listed on the Oslo Stock Exchange, has its headquarters in Heimdal, and NRK, which has one of its two national headquarters in the Tyholt district (the other is in Oslo), as well as writing two radio channels with national coverage.

Newspapers

Previously there were several newspapers in the city; today only Adresseavisen survives, founded in 1767, which claims to be the oldest newspaper in all of Norway.

Other major daily newspapers included Avisa Trondheim (originally Arbeider-Avisen), which ceased publication in 1996; Trondheimsavisa (originally Venstreavis, later Nidaros), until 1991; Dagsavisa, from 1945 to 1954, Ny Tid, from 1899 to 1947, and the largest daily in the city until the end of World War II, Dagsposten, which existed from 1877 to 1945.

The weekly Byavisa is freely distributed; It has been published since 1996 and comes out on Tuesdays. Finally, the Under Dusken newspaper is a student news outlet that comes out every other Tuesday.

Television

The Tyholttårnet (“Torre Tyholt”).

The local news station Midtnytt, whose scope is the province of Sør-Trøndelag, is part of the channel NRK1. Trondheim has its own television channel, TV-Adressa.

Radius

NRK has the headquarters of two of its national channels (P1 and P3) in Trondheim, as well as the music channel NRK mp3. In addition to local NRK broadcasts, Trondheim also has several local radio stations, including Radioadressa, which is owned by Adresseavisen. Radio Revolt is Trondheim's student station, closely connected to the Trondheim Student Association and the Student Welfare Association.

Politics and government

Central government

Delegation of the Government of Norway in Sør-Trøndelag.

Headquarters of the appellate and district courts.

Sør-Trøndelag Provincial Assembly.

Trondheim houses the seat of the Governor of Sør-Trøndelag, a government delegate who represents the king and the government of Norway, and as such ensures that decisions at the national level are carried out in the province. Its headquarters are in the former art nouveau building of the E. C. Dahl Foundation, at 10 E. C. Dahl Street.

The judiciary is based in Trondheim for the District Court of Sør-Trøndelag, with jurisdiction over 17 of the 25 municipalities in the province and the seat of Frostathing, one of Norway's six courts of appeal, with jurisdiction over the provinces of Møre og Romsdal, Sør-Trøndelag and Nord-Trøndelag.

Trondheim is home to some public institutions at the national level: the National Administration of Norwegian Courts; the Directorate for the Administration of Nature (under the Ministry of the Environment), and the Labor Inspection Authority, a unit of the Ministry of Labor focused on safety and health.

Provincial Government

As the provincial capital, the city is home to the Provincial Assembly, a legislative assembly elected by universal suffrage and charged with some responsibilities for public services and administration at the provincial level. The Provincial Assembly building (Sør-Trøndelag fylkeshus) is located at the corner of Erling Skakke and Munkegata streets.

Municipal government

Trondheim City Hall.

Rita Ottervik, of Labour affiliation, has been the municipal president of Trondheim since 2003.

The municipality of Trondheim is governed by a municipal council (bystyre). Its headquarters are Trondheim City Hall, a late-XIX century building at Munkegata No. 1. The Old City Hall, from the 18th century, it is now occupied by the Trondheim Public Library.

Until 2011, Trondheim City Council was the largest in all of Norway, with 85 members. Since the 2011 elections, the number of councilors has been reduced to 67—the same number as Bergen and Stavanger. In the period between 2011 and 2015 the council is made up of 10 political parties. The board of directors (formannskap) consists of 11 councilors elected proportionally from among the council and is the body that constitutes the government of the municipality.

The political force with the relative majority is the Labor Party, which has been in coalition with other forces of the center and left since 2003, although its vote fell in the last elections. Labor has 27 councilors (39.5% of the last vote); of which 4 are part of the board of directors, to which the municipal president, Labor Rita Ottervik, and the vice president, the socialist Knut Fagerbakke, belong.

In the last election, the vote for the Conservative Party rose considerably (27.2%, against 15% in 2007). This party governed Trondheim from 1990 to 2003, and is the second political force in the municipality.

Boroughs of Trondheim

Since 2005, the municipality of Trondheim is divided into four administrative districts (administrative bydeler):

• Midtbyen: Includes the neighborhoods of the Centre, Byåsen, Ila, Tempe, Elgeseter Stavne, Tyholt and Trolla.
• Østbyen: Includes Møllenberg, Nedre Elvehavn, Rosenborg, Lade, Strindheim, Jakobsli, Ranheim and Vikåsen.
• Lerkendal: Understand the neighborhoods of Lerkendal, Nardo, Risvollan, Flatåsen, Moholt, Gløshaugen, Åsvang, and Sjetnmarka.
• Heimdal: It includes the neighborhoods of Heimdal, Byneset, Tiller, Kattem, Kolstad/Saupstad and Klett.

The division of the districts does not have a historical basis, but merely demographic. Each of them has an estimated population of 40,000 people. This distribution is based on the Norwegian Labor and Welfare Administration, in which the municipal government and the Norwegian Ministry of Labor collaborate, and whose purpose is to ensure social security, employment and the welfare state. Each district of Trondheim has an office with that function.

The neighborhoods and the old towns of the municipality have no administrative significance, but only historical or geographical reference, and in many cases their limits are not even well defined.

Transportation

Roads

The main roads of the city and the municipality are two European highways. The E6 links the city with Lillehammer and Oslo to the south, and to the north with Kirkenes, on the border with Russia. The E39 runs from Trondheim south through the coast, to Ålesund, Bergen, Stavanger and Kristiansand.

Buses

Urban buses in the Munkegata.

Trondheim's city and suburban bus network is operated by the company Team Trafikk, a subsidiary of the state-owned company Nettbuss. It has 200 buses spread over 41 lines and transports an average of 60,000 passengers daily. Almost all the lines leave from a terminal on Munkegata street, in the center of the city —although some extend to the Central Railway Station, next to the port—, and from there they serve the entire metropolitan area. There is a special service, the Nattbuss (Night Bus), which runs on weekend nights.

The foreign bus service is operated by various companies, both public and private, and its terminal is located inside the Central Railway Station. There are departures to all municipalities in the province and to some of the province of Nord-Trøndelag, as well as Oslo and Bergen.

Tram

Tram.

Trondheim, apart from Oslo, is the only city in Norway that has a tram. This consists of a single 8.8 km line, the Gråkallbanen, which runs from the center to the Bymarka forest area in the west.

It is a transport in service since 1901. It reached its peak in the 1950s and 1960s, when it had 4 lines. From then on, there were debates between opposing positions on its unfeasibility and its preservation, which resulted in the reduction of lines until only the current one remained in service. The tram has been owned by the multinational Veolia Transport since 2005.

Air transportation

Trondheim-Værnes Airport.

Trondheim-Værnes Airport is located 19 km east of the city, in Værnes, within the municipality of Stjørdal. It began operating as a base for the Norwegian air force in 1917 and was opened to civil aviation in 1951. It is the fourth airport in Norway in terms of traffic, with 4,313,547 passengers carried and 60,830 movements made in 2013.

The main routes are direct flights to Oslo, Bergen and Bodø, but there are connections to 11 other Norwegian airports. There are international flights to Copenhagen (the main destination abroad), Amsterdam, Östersund, Stockholm, London and Reykjavik. There are also charter flights to central Europe, the Mediterranean and Las Palmas de Gran Canaria.

Railway

Trondheim Central Station.

At the Central Station, located next to the port, Trondheim is a terminus for four railway lines. The Nordlandsbanen runs north, bound for Bodø; the Meråkerbanen heads east to the Swedish towns of Storlien, Åre and Östersund; the Rørosbanen connects the city with Hamar, and finally the Dovrebanen connects Trondheim with Oslo.

The first train station was located in the Kalvskinnet neighborhood and was inaugurated in 1864 as part of the Størenbanen, a line of modest length that connected Trondheim with the town of Støren (today part of the municipality of Midtre Gauldal). That line was completely absorbed by Rørosbanen in 1877. The central station opened in 1882 to serve as a terminus for Meråkerbanen, but ended up being a terminus for both lines, which sparked a dispute in the city. The station has had to be enlarged and remodeled due to the inauguration of the Dobvrebanen (in 1921) and the increase in passenger traffic, which has turned it into a railway junction.

Sea transport

Port of Tronheim.

Since 2006, the port of Trondheim has been part of an inter-municipal association, officially called the Trondheim Fjord Inter-municipal Port, which also includes the ports of the municipalities of Stjørdal and Orkdal and is in charge of controlling operations in a coordinated manner. This port complex moves close to 2 million tons of merchandise and 2 million passengers annually. In Brattøra, one of the five port areas of Trondheim, there is an intermodal connection with rail and buses.

Cruise and ship of the Hurtigruten anchored in Trondheim.

Passenger transport by sea has declined in favor of highways and rail, but it still maintains tourist importance. In addition, it continues to be the best communication option between Trondheim and the municipalities of the Fosen peninsula, and the only one between the city and the islands of Hitra and Frøya. In this regard, there are daily catamaran and ferry routes along the fjord, reaching towns as far south as Kristiansund. The ferry service transports approximately 1.5 million vehicles annually.

The Hurtigruten, the express passenger service along the Norwegian west coast, has two daily arrivals in Trondheim, one southbound and one northbound. The route was inaugurated in 1893 precisely to connect Trondheim with the northern Norwegian coast, but in the XX century the southern terminal was moved to Bergen.

Just over 31,000 passengers, spread over an average of 60 cruise ships, arrive at the port of Trondheim annually.

Bikes

The Brubakken Street Bicycle Elevator.

As in other Nordic cities, there is also a deeply rooted culture of cycling in Trondheim. The municipality provides a bicycle rental service in different modules to citizens and tourists, mainly in the center and adjacent areas, including the university. The loan is through an electronic card that the user pays annually for a small cost.

Trondheim has a state-of-the-art bicycle lift on a steep street in the Bakklandet neighborhood that is considered unique in the world. In it the bicycles and their cyclists are raised to the top of the street.

Twinnings

The following cities are twinned with Trondheim: