Mülheim, North Rhine-Westphalia, Germany

🇩🇪 Mülheim an der Ruhr, also described as "City on the River", is a city in North Rhine-Westphalia in Germany. It is located in the Ruhr Area between Duisburg, Essen, Oberhausen and Ratingen. It is home to many companies, especially in the food industry, such as Plus, the Aldi Süd Company, the Harke Group and the Tengelmann Group.

Mülheim received its town charter in 1808, and 100 years later the population exceeded 100,000, making Mülheim officially a city. At the time of the city's 200th anniversary it was counted among the smaller cities of Germany.

Geography: Location Mülheim an der Ruhr is located to the south-west of Essen in the Ruhr valley.

Geology The northern foothills of the Rhenish Massif are characterised by the distinctive rock formation of the bare mountain slopes through which run coal-bearing layers which formed during the carboniferous period. Here the Ruhr cuts more than 50 meters deep into this Mittelgebirge. This natural erosion partly uncovered these mineable black coal deposits, which enabled their exploration and extraction using adits. However, the coal-rich layers became ever deeper as one progressed northward, which required setting up mines to extract the black coal. In contrast, the broad bayou (dead arm of a river) of Styrum borough is characteristic of the features of the Lower Rhine Plain.

Transport The U18 metro line connects the city with Essen.

Education and research Mülheim is home to two Max Planck Institutes, a university campus, and various other educational and scientific institutions. • Max Planck Institute for Coal Research • Max Planck Institute for Chemical Energy Conversion • Ruhr West University of Applied Sciences, main campus • IWW Water Centre, water research institute of the University of Duisburg-Essen • 39 Schools, among them 22 primary schools, 12 general secondary schools, 2 vocational schools, 1 Waldorf school, and 2 special schools.

Companies • Plus (founded 1972), a supermarket chain • Tengelmann (founded 1867), a holding company • Aldi Süd (founded 1946, split in two parts in 1960, renamed to Aldi Süd in 1962), a discount supermarket chain • Harke Group, formerly Syntana (founded 1965), a chemical and plastics distributor • Europipe GmbH (founded 1991), main manufacturer of seamless pipes for the Nord Stream pipelines.

Sports clubs • 1. FC Mülheim (founded 1923), a football club • VfB Speldorf (founded 1919), a football club • HTC Uhlenhorst Mülheim (founded 1920), a field hockey club.