Dresden architecture and numerous world-renowned museums and art collections, Dresden has been called "Elbflorenz" (Florence of the Elbe). The incorporation of neighbouring rural communities over the past 60 years has made Dresden the twelfth largest urban district by area in Germany after Berlin, Hamburg and Cologne. The nearest German cities are Chemnitz to the southwest, Leipzig to the northwest and Berlin to the north. Prague, Czech Republic is about to the south and to the east is the Polish city of Wrocław. Dresden is one of the greenest cities in all of Europe, with 63% of the city being green areas
Accession of Hamburg to the German Customs Union (Zollverein) very vigorously against such ideas. It invoked the free-trade argument that every protective tariff is an unjust burden on the many to benefit the few. In this case, in favour to the union vessels, to which all the consumers of imported articles, as well as the exporting producers, would have to pay monopoly prices for sea transport. The Hamburg Senate did not wish to know anything about a common flag either: it was in the interests of the Hanseatic cities that they retain their own flags, and thus present themselves abroad as neutral trade republics, even if German states went