THE BATTLE OF VESTKANTEN, OSLO
(Semi-Fictional)
ABOUT THE LOCATION
Spoiler
This is a part of the capital of Norway which is on the West part of Olso (The city is split in two parts, the West and the East part) in Norwegian it is called “Østkanten” og “Vestkanten”. West-Oslo features important locations like the Palace of the Norwegian Royal family, which is more or less in the center of this area, it also features the whole coastal line/harbor of the city. Near the older part of the city which is is near the city centrum to the King’s estate, was where the German forces landed their tanks and armored vehicles during the Invasion of Norway the 9th of April 1940, among other stuff the famous Neubaufahrzeug were used. Whilst i have no information whether or not these Germans tanks saw direct combat with anti tank weapons, it is highly likely that it was, tough only with one or more improvised vehicles, as i have reports on a truck of some sort with an 40mm Anti air cannon that had been placed on it’s bed as a quick improvisation to slow down the invasion and give the Royal family time to flee the city.
One interesting thing to also mention is that the very popular movie series Olsenbanden, “The Olsen Gang” that was filmed in this area. The first movies came out in the late 1960’s and a dozen was made until 1999, this was a Norwegian copy of the Danish which made the original series, under the same name, they collaborated on several occasions, like several actors was used between them throughout the series. One of those, in “Olsenbanden gir seg aldri” - “The Olsen band never gives up” released in 1981, a part of the movie and their hest/operation included stealing a Tank from the Army which was exercising at Fornebu Airport, this was an early Leopard 1 tank, and was in relation to the filming driven on several locations trough the city, with the most scenes being shot in near the Minkedamsveien which is more or less in the city center, near Aker Harbour. This was probably the first time any main battle tanks had driven anywhere near that area, at least of modern medium heavy tanks, as extensive road reparations had do be done afterwards due to the tank being too heavy for the road to handle, and made several holes in the road and collapsed some parts of it.
This is what sparked the idea of this map, and considering the location has some history relevant to warfare and tanks, it might be a semi semi historical, or semi fictional location for a tank battle in-game to take place. It could be something in between the current Swedish city map and like the Port Novorossiysk, featuring a unique layout of buildings and landscape with a beautiful fjord and harbor area. I was thinking about making two version’s of this, one in the Eastern area and one in the Western area which features more of a inland landscape. There were also several parades in these areas when Norway was liberated from the German occupation forces in 1945, which mostly were lend leased british equipment like Humbers, M24 chaffe’s and ex german machinery and tanks that were put in use by the army.
THE LAYOUT
Spoiler
In the image above i have marked an approx. 4x4km. Here are many options for layouts, but the Palace in the middle as it obviously would be the most strategic important point of the map, and should therefore be one of the map sones. Below is just a sketch just to get the “basics” of it’s potential layout, completely generic, except the middle point being over the palace.
IMAGES OF THE LOCATION
Spoiler
The royal palace looks magnificent and has a rather large courtyard around it, making it well suited for tank combat.
COORDINATES
- Yes
- No