Dutch broadcaster NOS already called it a “civil war”, which seems a bit rich. But the massive protests in Stuttgart against work on the new train station (S21), for which over 300 trees in the Schlosspark need to be cut down, are impressive.
And dangerous: one protester lost an eye, several others were wounded.
The positive result is: much media-coverage in German media, but also elsewhere in Europe. The BBC can be trusted to place the matter in a broader perspective, predicting repercussions for the Merkel administration.
The current Schlosspark is quite different from the park, redesigned as a Volkspark in the early 1800s (although laid out under the ruler of the day, the garden was open to the common public at all times). But relics of earlier layouts can still be seen, especially in the form of some 300 years old trees -but you may need to be quick to see those standing tall.
Two national garden exhibitions have taken their toll on large portions of the layout in the second half of the 20th century. 1Although they added new features and styles of gardening as wel. According to gardenvisit.com ‘Walking from the city center to the Rosenstein allows one to follow a textbook illustration of design evolution between 1939 and 1993.’ In 1993, the Schlosspark became part of the “Grüne U“, a green lung consisting of Schlossgarten, Rosensteinpark, Leibfriedschem Garten, Wartberggelände and Höhenpark Killesberg.
That enrollment in a larger green area may now be working against the park: it is probably much easier to fell 300 year old trees in an area called “Grüne U”, than when the discussion is just about cutting down trees like that in the old Schlosspark.
See the HGimages link under this post for photos of both the park and the protests.
Footnotes
| ↑1 | Although they added new features and styles of gardening as wel. According to gardenvisit.com ‘Walking from the city center to the Rosenstein allows one to follow a textbook illustration of design evolution between 1939 and 1993.’ |
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Although 25 trees have actually been cut down in the night of 30 September and 1 October 2010, the felling has since stopped. The reason is that the ‘Mittleren Schlossgarten’ is one of the few habitats of the hermit beetle: they are found in seven trees in this part of the park. The felling restrictions are also in place because bats are occupying some trees in the park.
According to German media, DB Projektbau is ordered to draw up a plan to protect both species, before they can go ahead with the felling of some 300 trees. The work is not expected to be resumed before the Fall of 2011.
The question whether Deutsche Bahn, who ordered the start of the felling, could have known about these protected species is answered in the article linked to earlier: apparently they did, but chose to ignore the advise of the Eisenbahbundesamt not to cut down the trees.