Brandenburg Gate role in 2018 European Athletics Championships. It is also the usual finish line of the Berlin Marathon. A Soviet flag flew from a flagpole atop the gate from 1945 until 1957, when it was replaced by an East German flag. Since the reunification of Germany, the flag and the pole have been removed. During the 1953 riots in East Berlin the Soviet flag was torn off by West Germans. In 1963, U.S. President John F. Kennedy visited the Brandenburg Gate. The Soviets hung large red banners across it to prevent him looking into East Berlin. In the 1980s, decrying the
City Gate (Valletta) and present city gate was constructed between 2011 and 2014 to designs of Renzo Piano. This gate is very different from the previous ones, as it consists of a breach in the bastions, flanked by large blocks of stone which are separated from the curtain walls by high blades of steel. Like the fourth gate, it was also built as part of a project to redesign the city entrance. The project also turned the ruins of the Royal Opera House into an open-air theatre known as "Pjazza Teatru Rjal", and a new Parliament House was built occupying part of Freedom