Meanwhile passengers waiting to
board the train on the platform had to wait, all whom would have been
people who'd arrived by U-Bahn or S-Bahn from West Berlin.

Not quite . When I was there in 1989 pensioners were allowed to exit the
Socialist Utopia in the street outside and there were a lot of Poles coming
through the checkpoint below (and checkpoint charlie too - (for Luko's
benefit that's the Uberganstelle Friedrichstrasse/Zimmerstrasse) . I think
the Poiish Government must have told the DDR to let them pass.

There was a ticket office at Friedrichstrasse station which sold tickets to
the West - in DM naturally, and you could by a ticket for 2,90M at East
Berlin S Bahn stations to Berlin-West.




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