Immervad

Immervad

Immervad towards Lille Torv with Magasin du Nord to the left
Former name(s)	Emmervad
Length	110 m (360 ft)
Location	Latin Quarter, Aarhus, Denmark
Postal code	8000
Coordinates	56°09′25.6″N 10°12′25.6″E / 56.157111°N 10.207111°E / 56.157111; 10.207111

Immervad, previously Emmervad, is a pedestrian street in Aarhus, Denmark which runs north to south from Lille Torv to Åboulevarden and Frederiksgade. The alley Sankt Clemens Stræde leads to Immervad from the east. The street is situated in the historic Latin Quarter neighborhood and has existed as a road or street since the viking age when it was used as the eastern ford to cross the Aarhus River. Immervad is fairly short at just 110 meters long but it is one of the streets with the most foot traffic in Aarhus. The southern section of the street is the bridge Frederiksbroen, the first bridge built to cross the river in the city.

Immervad is home to the department store Magasin du Nord, one of the largest in Aarhus, and runs next to the recreational space Vadestedet (English: The Ford) on the street Åboulevarden which runs perpendicular to Immervad in its southern end.

The name Immervad is unique as a street name in Danish cities. The ending "vad" refers to the Danish word "Vadested" (Ford) while "Immer" is of unknown origin. It is possible Immer is the German word meaning "Always", an allusion to a ford that can always be crossed. Another theory is that the original spelling Emmervad refers to a person named Emmer who may have lived by the ford. A third theory states that Emmer was the leftovers after creating slaked lime, used to stabilize the river floor at the ford. However, there are also indications that the name was not known in the Middle Ages as sources from 1512 mentions the street as "the street to the bridge".

The southern section of Immervad is the bridge Frederiks Bro or Frederiksbroen. It is not known exactly when Frederiks Bro was built but it existed in the 1400s when Brobjerg on the south side of the bridge was settled. The bridge was early on known as Brobjerg Bridge (Brobjerg Bro) and from the 1600s to 1824 as Basballe Bridge (Basballe Bro) after one of the prominent merchant families that lived on Immervad at the time. In 1824 the street south of the bridge was renamed Frederiksgade after King Frederik VI who visited Aarhus at the time and at the same time the bridge was renamed to Frederiks Bro. In the 1930s the section of the river which runs through the city proper was paved over and the bridge was dismantled. In 1989 Aarhus City Council officially adopted a policy to reopen the river and between 2005 and 2008 the section from Immervad to Vester Allé was reopened and a bridge reestablished. The name Frederiks Bro is not a well known as a larger and more prominent bridge on Frederiks Allé carries the same name.