If Wilhelm Greil was the mayor of the extension, the Viennese-born Eduard Klingler (1861 - 1916) could be described as its architect. Klingler had a significant influence on the cityscape of Innsbruck. He began working for the state of Tyrol in 1883. In 1889 he joined the municipal building authority, becoming its head in 1902. During this period of economic boom, the city began to expand. The two previously independent neighbouring communities of Pradl and Wilten were incorporated in 1904, which contributed massively to its growth. From 1880 to 1900, Innsbruck's population "only" grew from 20,000 to 26,000 inhabitants, while Wilten tripled from 4,000 to 12,000. 

The rapid increase in population presented the city administration with major challenges. In addition to the quantitative growth caused by the expansion of the city, Innsbruck also "grew" qualitatively in terms of people's quality of life. The city pushed ahead with building activity. Gas, water and electricity began to become standard. Schools and kindergartens had to be built for the new residents. The demands on medicine and thus the clinic grew. In Innsbruck, the commercial academy, the Leitgebschule, the Pradl cemetery, the dermatological clinic on the hospital grounds, the municipal kindergarten in Michael-Gaismair-Straße, the Trainkaserne (note: today a residential building) and the Tyrolean State Conservatory are on Klingler's account as head of the municipal building department. The Ulrichhaus on Mount Isel, which today houses the Alt-Kaiserjäger-Club, is a building in the local style that is well worth seeing.

The first free elections to the Imperial Council for all male citizens in 1907 changed the social rules of the game. The housing that was built in the working-class neighbourhoods was a reflection of a new society. Workers and employees with political voting rights had different needs than subjects without this right. Unlike in rural Tyrol, where farming families and their servants lived in farmhouses as a clan, life in the city came close to the family life we know today. The lifestyle of city dwellers demanded multi-room flats.

However, the social divide manifested itself not only in the functionality of the flats, but also in the architecture. In keeping with the spirit of the time, the projects were designed in the styles of historicism, classicism and Heimatstil. Until the outbreak of the First World War, clear forms, masks, statues and columns were style-defining elements in the design of new buildings. The ideas that architects had of classical Greece and ancient Rome were realised in a sometimes wild mix. Not only public buildings, but also large apartment blocks and even entire streets such as Sonnenburgstraße, Grillparzerstraße, Stafflerstraße, Kaiser-Josef-Straße and Claudiastraße reflect the style of the time.

The 12th century brought economic, scientific and social prosperity to parts of Europe and is regarded as a kind of early Renaissance in the Middle Ages. The Crusades led to increased exchange with the cultures of the Middle East, which were more developed in many respects. Arab scholars brought translations of Greek thinkers such as Aristotle to Europe via southern Spain and Italy. Roman law was rediscovered. The first universities were founded in Italy. Agricultural knowledge allowed the development of towns and larger settlements. One of these settlements was located north of the Wilten monastery between the Inn river and the Nordkette mountain range.

When the Western Roman Empire collapsed in the 5th century, Bavarian tribes took control of the area that is now Innsbruck. They were happy to take over church institutions and structures, as clerics were often the only ones who knew the scriptures. In the time of Charlemagne (748 - 814), the feudal system began to establish itself in Central Europe. The dukes of Bavaria were feudal lords of the German kings and emperors, whose empire extended over large parts of central Europe and northern Italy.

Tyrol had two low Alpine crossings, the Reschen Pass and the Brenner Pass, which were important for the imperial connection between the German lands in the north and the lands in Italy. In 1024, Conrad II, a rival of the Bavarian dukes, was elected king. In order to bring these two Alpine crossings away from his Bavarian rivals and under the control of the Church, which was closer and more loyal to the emperor, Conrad II granted the territory of Tyrol to the bishops of Brixen and Trento as a fief in 1027. In order to administer their lands and exercise jurisdiction, the bishops needed local representatives, the so-called bailiffs. The bailiffs of the Bishop of Brixen were the Counts of Andechs. They came from the area around the Bavarian Ammersee. They administered the central part of the Inn Valley, the Wipp Valley and the Eisack Valley for the bishops. Over the next 200 years, this Bavarian princely family was to become the birthplace of the city of Innsbruck.

Today, Innsbruck stretches along both sides of the Inn. In the 11th century, this area was under the influence of two lords of the manor. To the south of the Inn, the Wilten monastery had its lordship. The area north of the Inn belonged to the Counts of Andechs. While the southern part of the town around the monastery was used for agriculture early on, the alluvial area of the unregulated river could not be cultivated before the High Middle Ages and was sparsely populated. The Andechs family founded the market here in 1133 Anbruggen and connected the northern and southern banks of the Inn via a bridge. The unusable agricultural land had become a trading centre. The bridge greatly facilitated the movement of goods in the Eastern Alps. The customs revenue generated from trade between the German and Italian towns allowed the settlement to prosper. Innsbruck's first surviving coat of arms dates back to 1267 and shows the Inn bridge on the stone boxes used to secure it at the time.

Anbruggen grew rapidly, but the space between the Nordkette and the Inn was limited. In 1180, Berchtold V of Andechs therefore acquired a piece of land on the south side of the Inn from Wilten Monastery. This was the starting signal for Innsbruck. In the course of building the city wall, the Counts of Andechs had the Andechs Castle and moved their ancestral seat from Merano to Innsbruck. This settlement also grew rapidly and sometime between 1187 and 1204 the people of Innsbruck were able to enjoy city rights. The official date of foundation is often taken as 1239, when the last Count of Andechs, Otto VIII, confirmed the town charter in a document. At this time, Innsbruck was already the mint of the Andechs family and would probably have become the capital of their principality. But things turned out differently. Otto died in 1248 without descendants. The Counts of Tyrol took control of the Inn Valley and the city. They made Merano the first capital of the province of Tyrol.

One of the most important figures in the town's history was Wilhelm Greil (1850 - 1923). From 1896 to 1923, the businessman held the office of mayor, having previously helped to shape the city's fortunes as deputy mayor. Due to an electoral system based on the right to vote via property classes, large mass parties such as the Social Democrats were not yet able to assert themselves. The second half of the 19th century was characterised by the struggle between liberal and conservative forces in Innsbruck city politics. In contrast to the rest of Tyrol, the conservatives had a hard time in Innsbruck, whose population had been in favour of liberal ideas since the Napoleonic era.

Greil belonged to the "Deutschen Volkspartei", a liberal and national-Great German party. What appears to us today as a contradiction, liberal and national, was a politically common and well-functioning pair of ideas in the 19th century. Pan-Germanism was not a political peculiarity of a radical right-wing minority, but rather a centrist trend, particularly in German-speaking cities of the Reich, which was important in varying forms through almost all parties until after the Second World War. Whoever issues the liberal Innsbrucker Nachrichten of the period around the turn of the century, you will find countless articles in which the common ground between the German Reich and the German-speaking countries was made the topic of the day.

Greil was a skilful politician who operated within the predetermined power structures of his time. He knew how to skilfully manoeuvre around the traditional powers, the monarchy and the clergy, and how to come to terms with them. Under him, the city purchased land with foresight in the spirit of the merchant in order to make projects possible. Under Wilhelm Greil, Innsbruck expanded considerably. The politician Greil was able to rely on the civil servants and town planners Eduard Klingler, Jakob Albert and Theodor Prachensky for the major building projects of the time. In addition to the villas in Saggen, residential buildings were also built in the eastern part of the neighbourhood. Infrastructure projects such as the new town hall in Maria-Theresienstraße in 1897, the Hungerburg railway in 1906 and the Karwendelbahn were realised. Other projects included the renovation of the market square and the construction of the market hall.

Much of what was pioneered in the second half of the 19th century is part of everyday life today. For the people of that time, however, these things were a real sensation and life-changing. The four decades between the economic crisis of 1873 and the First World War were characterised by unprecedented economic growth and rapid modernisation. The city's economy boomed. Businesses were established in Pradl and Wilten, attracting workers. Tourism also brought fresh capital into the city.

His predecessor, Mayor Heinrich Falk (1840 - 1917), had already contributed significantly to the modernisation of the town and the settlement of Saggen. Since 1859, the lighting of the city with gas pipelines had progressed steadily. Between 1887 and 1891, Innsbruck was equipped with a modern high-pressure water pipeline, which could also be used to supply flats on higher floors with fresh water. Wilhelm Greil arranged for the gas works in Pradl and the electricity works in Mühlau to be taken over into municipal ownership. The street lighting was converted to electric light.

Greil was able to secure Innsbrucker Renaissance on patrons from the town's middle classes. Baron Johann von Sieberer donated the old people's asylum and the orphanage in Saggen. Leonhard Lang donated the building, previously used as a hotel, to which the town hall moved from the old town in 1897, in return for the town's promise to build a home for apprentices.

In his last years in office, Greil accompanied Innsbruck through the transition from the Habsburg Monarchy to the Republic, a period characterised above all by hunger, misery, scarcity of resources and insecurity. He was 68 years old when Italian troops occupied the city after the First World War and Tyrol was divided at the Brenner Pass, which was particularly bitter for him as a representative of German nationalism.

In 1928, former mayor Greil died as an honorary citizen of the city of Innsbruck at the age of 78. Wilhelm-Greil-Straße was named after him during his lifetime.

Like the course of the city's history, its appearance is also subject to constant change. The years around 1500 and between 1850 and 1900, when political, economic and social changes took place at a particularly rapid pace, produced particularly visible changes in the cityscape. However, the most drastic event with the greatest impact on the cityscape was probably the air raids on the city during the Second World War.

In addition to the food shortage, people suffered from what the National Socialists called the "Heimatfront" in the city were particularly affected by the Allied air raids. Innsbruck was an important supply station for supplies on the Italian front.

The first Allied air raid on the ill-prepared city took place on the night of 15-16 December 1943. 269 people fell victim to the bombs, 500 were injured and more than 1500 were left homeless. Over 300 buildings, mainly in Wilten and the city centre, were destroyed and damaged. On Monday 18 December, the following were found in the Innsbrucker Nachrichten, dem Vorgänger der Tiroler Tageszeitung, auf der Titelseite allerhand propagandistische Meldungen vom erfolgreichen und heroischen Abwehrkampf der Deutschen Wehrmacht an allen Fronten gegenüber dem Bündnis aus Anglo-Amerikanern und dem Russen, nicht aber vom Bombenangriff auf Innsbruck.

Bombenterror über Innsbruck

Innsbruck, 17. Dez. Der 16. Dezember wird in der Geschichte Innsbrucks als der Tag vermerkt bleiben, an dem der Luftterror der Anglo-Amerikaner die Gauhauptstadt mit der ganzen Schwere dieser gemeinen und brutalen Kampfweise, die man nicht mehr Kriegführung nennen kann, getroffen hat. In mehreren Wellen flogen feindliche Kampfverbände die Stadt an und richteten ihre Angriffe mit zahlreichen Spreng- und Brandbomben gegen die Wohngebiete. Schwerste Schäden an Wohngebäuden, an Krankenhäusern und anderen Gemeinschaftseinrichtungen waren das traurige, alle bisherigen Schäden übersteigende Ergebnis dieses verbrecherischen Überfalles, der über zahlreiche Familien unserer Stadt schwerste Leiden und empfindliche Belastung der Lebensführung, das bittere Los der Vernichtung liebgewordenen Besitzes, der Zerstörung von Heim und Herd und der Heimatlosigkeit gebracht hat. Grenzenloser Haß und das glühende Verlangen diese unmenschliche Untat mit schonungsloser Schärfe zu vergelten, sind die einzige Empfindung, die außer der Auseinandersetzung mit den eigenen und den Gemeinschaftssorgen alle Gemüter bewegt. Wir alle blicken voll Vertrauen auf unsere Soldaten und erwarten mit Zuversicht den Tag, an dem der Führer den Befehl geben wird, ihre geballte Kraft mit neuen Waffen gegen den Feind im Westen einzusetzen, der durch seinen Mord- und Brandterror gegen Wehrlose neuerdings bewiesen hat, daß er sich von den asiatischen Bestien im Osten durch nichts unterscheidet – es wäre denn durch größere Feigheit. Die Luftschutzeinrichtungen der Stadt haben sich ebenso bewährt, wie die Luftschutzdisziplin der Bevölkerung. Bis zur Stunde sind 26 Gefallene gemeldet, deren Zahl sich aller Voraussicht nach nicht wesentlich erhöhen dürfte. Die Hilfsmaßnahmen haben unter Führung der Partei und tatkräftigen Mitarbeit der Wehrmacht sofort und wirkungsvoll eingesetzt.

Diese durch Zensur und Gleichschaltung der Medien fantasievoll gestaltete Nachricht schaffte es gerade mal auf Seite 3. Prominenter wollte man die schlechte Vorbereitung der Stadt auf das absehbare Bombardement wohl nicht dem Volkskörper präsentieren. Ganz so groß wie 1938 nach dem Anschluss, als Hitler am 5. April von 100.000 Menschen in Innsbruck begeistert empfangen worden war, dürfte die Begeisterung für den Nationalsozialismus nicht mehr gewesen sein. Zu groß waren die Schäden an der Stadt und die persönlichen, tragischen Verluste in der Bevölkerung. Im Jänner 1944 begann man Luftschutzstollen und andere Schutzmaßnahmen zu errichten. Die Arbeiten wurden zu einem großen Teil von Gefangenen des Konzentrationslagers Reichenau durchgeführt.

Innsbruck was attacked a total of twenty-two times between 1943 and 1945. Almost 3833, i.e. almost 50%, of the city's buildings were damaged and 504 people died. Fortunately, the city was only the victim of targeted attacks. German cities such as Hamburg or Dresden were completely razed to the ground by the Allies with firestorms and tens of thousands of deaths within a few hours. Many buildings such as the Jesuit Church, Wilten Abbey, the Servite Church, the cathedral and the indoor swimming pool in Amraserstraße were hit.

Historic buildings and monuments received special treatment during the attacks. The Goldene Dachl was protected with a special construction, as was Maximilian's sarcophagus in the Hofkirche. The figures in the Hofkirche, the Schwarzen Mannderwere brought to Kundl. The Mother of Mercy, the famous picture from Innsbruck Cathedral, was transferred to Ötztal during the war.

The air-raid shelter tunnel south of Innsbruck on Brennerstrasse and the markings of houses with air-raid shelters with their black squares and white circles and arrows can still be seen today. In Pradl, where next to Wilten most of the buildings were damaged, bronze plaques on the affected houses indicate that they were hit by a bomb.