Amagerport

Vesterport, Østerport and Nørreport are each well-known geographical designations of the everyday life in Copenhagen, while Amagerport is less known. In forort has amer times, these four town gates served as crossings whenever you had to get in and out of the town. At these gates town officials collected toll. Each of the gates was a building in itself. Today, these buildings do not exist anymore. Vesterport, Østerport, and Nørreport are still well-known designations as each of them is an important railway station. As there is no railway station on Amager, the designation of Amagerplmost disappeared from our everyday language.

Amagerport was situated where Torvegade cuts through the ramparts today. The first gate was built in 1668, the next was built in 1724, and this gate was remarkably decorated with sandstones - particularly on the side that faced Amager.

Amagerport was the least important of Copenhagen's four gates, as this was not a gate to the wide and open country but only to the island of Amager. Thus, only the peasants of Amager were passing through this gate! In 1856, Copenhagen had its fortresses pulled down. That is, the idea of having ramparts and fortifications around the town was abandoned. Instead, we got some beautiful parks like the ramparts of Christianshavn. It was, however, not until the turn of the century that the park was opened for recreational purposes. The other old ramparts are Østre Anlæg, Botanisk Have, Ørstedparken, and Tivoli. Together, these ramparts made up another essential fortification of the town with the three town gates (today, a town gate like this can be seen in the town of Stege where they have managed to preserve it, although it is quiet inconvenient for the traffic). In 1920, the Copenhagen Highway Authority had milestones set up where the four town gates stood before. Here, on Christianshavn, the milestone stands exactly where the gate stood. The milestones are designed by architect P.V. Jensen Klint (father of the famous furniture designer Kaare Klint) who also designed Grundtvigskirken and the marvellous toilet building Suppeterrinen in the middle of Trianglen. Peter Olesen, journalist and write