Wurstelprater

The Wurstelprater is the amusement quarter at the western end of the Prater, Vienna's great public park in the second district. The Prater itself was a royal hunting ground until 1766, when Emperor Joseph II opened it to everyone and allowed showmen, coffee houses and inns to set up there. Puppet shows, swings and carousels followed, and by the late nineteenth century the area had grown into a permanent fairground. It has never become a gated theme park: walking in costs nothing, and each ride, stall and ghost train is run and priced separately by its own operator.

Its landmark is the Wiener Riesenrad, the giant Ferris wheel built in 1897 by the British engineer Walter Bassett. About 65 metres tall, it was the tallest Ferris wheel still standing anywhere from 1920 until 1985. It was badly damaged in the Second World War and was rebuilt with only half of its original thirty cabins, and in 1949 it became a film location in The Third Man. Around it cluster attractions of every generation, from traditional ghost trains, bumper cars and log flumes to more than a dozen roller coasters, among them the wooden Auto-Bergbahn from 1948, and the Praterturm, a chair swing that lifts riders over 100 metres into the air. The Liliputbahn, a miniature railway, carries passengers from the fairground deep into the green Prater woods.

The main season runs from mid-March to the end of October, when most rides operate from late morning until around midnight; the Riesenrad itself turns all year. The mix suits almost everyone: small children have old-fashioned carousels and gentle rides, teenagers and thrill-seekers have the drop towers and coasters and many Viennese simply come to stroll and eat in the garden restaurants. Two or three hours are enough for a stroll and a few rides, and the fairground is liveliest on summer evenings.

Getting there

The Wurstelprater lies in Vienna's Leopoldstadt district, about 1.8 km from the centre of neighbouring Landstraße and a short walk from the historic city centre across the Danube Canal. Praterstern station, served by metro lines U1 and U2 and by S-Bahn trains, is right at the park's edge. Vienna International Airport (VIE) is about 17 km away; the S7 suburban train runs from the airport directly to Praterstern.