Hometown Photo

Hometown Photo

Tuesday, August 21, 2012

Helpoort

Maastricht, in the summertime, is far from bereft of beautiful things to see when simply walking around the city. Stadspark, as mentioned before, is an extensive park in the city. One of the sections of the park runs alongside the old city walls, and takes you directly to Helpoort, the old city gate.

After gaining city rights in 1204, Maastricht built a wall around the city for defense purposes. Helpoort was the city gate for this set of walls which was constructed in 1229. As such, Helpoort is one of the oldest surviving city gates in the Netherlands.


As the city grew and developed, additional walls were built around the city which actually steered much of the traffic away from Helpoort. The movement of traffic away from Helpoort is probably one of the things that has enabled it to be standing today.



Yet another pretty place in Maastricht! 

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