Düsseldorf is a wealthy city--the richest in Germany. It's big and commercial, full of banks and industrial offices and skyscrapers, but it's also refreshingly clean. Düsseldorf got its start as a settlement on the right bank of the Rhine, but today it's spread out on both sides--the older part on the right and the modern, commercial, and industrial part on the left. Five bridges connect the two sections, the most impressive being the Oberkassel. Parks and esplanades line the riverbanks. After 85% of the right bank was destroyed in World War II, the city could easily have grown into just another ugly manufacturing town, but Düsseldorf followed a modern trend in reconstruction, and today it's the most elegant metropolis in the Rhine Valley.