Feature photo: Wollhaus Bridge in August 2022
Table of Contents
Flein Street
As is well known, the Wollhaus is located at the end of Fleiner Straße. There has been a problem with this for a long time. One could have tackled this problem in a “metropolitan” way and got down to business. I made suggestions on that too. The Wollhaus offers space for a real bus station, which has long been common in larger cities — even in Backnang — and you could still connect this with the tram, which then returns to its old route via Sontheim. Such an urban infrastructure development can be seen well and again and again in Ulm. And next to this bus station, ideally integrated into an overall concept, the long-needed large event hall is being built, preferably with a hotel and other shops open all day. A new Wollhaus center, so to speak, as a motor not only for the southern inner city!
So, once again, we chose the provincial solution, which is already falling on our feet! Worse still, the GALERIA Karstadt Kaufhof continues to crumble, and if this also becomes a problem, the whole thing falls apart right down to Kiliansplatz.
Yes, and we normal people from Heilbronn could also do something, namely by continuing to shop locally in Heilbronn! Even if some shops and their employees sometimes make it a little harder for us.
A city is a community and, like all other cities, stands and falls with its own citizens. We are Heilbronn and Heilbronn is the way we do it!
tower road
Today the Heilbronner Voice is dedicated to (3.11.2022: 24) once again the Turmstrasse, because we citizens were once again promised a renovation. The Heilbronnerstimme could certainly publish a multi-volume book about these promises - but the Heilbronnerstimme also writes once again about how you can just talk to pieces of necessary renovations.
Ok, something has happened in Turmstraße in the last few months, as some municipal councilors and administrative employees were probably seen there for the first time — I doubt whether they then spoke to the local residents, because they usually bring them on such occasions their citizens themselves. In any case, for a lot of money, the little greenery was even more restricted and concreted over with a larger book box. In addition, a few metal parts have been placed on the sidewalk in such a way that pedestrians now have to move onto the street, since the sidewalk now only has space for e-bikes, e-scooters and motorbikes. I have to admit, the sprinkler system with seating impressed me - but it would have been better if the outrageously expensive sprinkler system on Kranenstraße had been repaired and not all the still expensive BUGA plants had been left to wither there. Unfortunately, the city leaders only care about the show and sustainability and responsibility are pure devil stuff for these citizens!
It also fits that a sports box was recently set up in Turmstraße, which was very well received by the press, the meaning and purpose of which is only really apparent to the initiated. If the voice of Heilbronn continues to cheer this sports box as the ultimate event and we citizens thank our administration for it, then we will definitely get another five such boxes next year and all sports facilities will be removed from the city budget for 2023.
But back to Turmstrasse. We citizens are now being questioned about this — again, this is costing us a small fortune and employing only consultants and companies and keeping our administrative staff from doing their actual work.
Decades ago, people wanted to rehabilitate Turmstraße and even promised us the raising of the Pfühlbach, which was a good idea back then and would be a benefit for Heilbronn today, according to the statements of experts and even those responsible for the city. But that costs money, which would be invested sensibly, but the municipal council has no understanding for something like that. It is better to waste money on elite wheelhouses, useless bridges, 3D models that nobody can find anymore, or preferably on all kinds of consultants.
This time the Turmstraße gets a "realization competition" and I have to ask myself how we got the traffic on Kirchbrunnenstraße back then?
After a good 40 years of Turmstrasse chatter, it would be time to either simply declare Turmstrasse a pedestrian zone — that doesn’t cost 1 euros — or rebuild it in a similar way to Kirchbrunnenstrasse, that could be done as early as summer 000 and it wouldn’t cost the earth either.
But in a few years we will again receive a conversion concept - this time a wickedly expensive one - for Turmstraße, only to find out that in the current situation you don't want to spend the money on it! Just like in the last decades before!
And in the 22nd century, a city employee put up a sign overnight: "Pedestrian zone Turmstraße, parking only for residents and very special people."
Zonen
The "Zone" was not a desirable place to stay for us older people - some still have very eerie memories of it today. Everything is different today and Heilbronn has several zones, namely the so-called 37 inner-city parking zones, which are combined into six zone areas.
As the relevant signs are slowly but surely being found in the city, attentive people from Heilbronn have already become aware of them. I recently wrote here in the blog about it, because I obviously live in such a zone myself. But if you call up the corresponding website of the city of Heilbronn, what I was doing while writing, then you have to realize that I don't live in such a parking zone after all.
The area where I was born is clearly in such a parking zone, which neither residents of Heilbronn nor other people are really interested in, and those Heilbronn residents who have a corresponding paid parking permit there are always busy trying to get hold of a parking space between the many illegal parkers. And I don't want to speculate now about how many of them will then be forced to park outside, since the zoning is really a petty-bourgeois one.
But now back to my completely new zone, which according to the city administration actually doesn't exist. And so it is only logical that we affected citizens were not even informed about it. The new signs also don't say which parking permit you can use to park in the district, so I find parked vehicles in parking zones 5 and 30 right in front of my driveway. In any case, you can now park there for two hours with a parking disc, which may deter the more sensitive commuters from parking their vehicles there during the day. However, the owners of second or even third vehicles from the new neighborhood will still have no choice but to own the parking space they have secured for as long as possible.
I am now using this blog post as a request to the city councilors I trust — they actually exist (!) and there are quite a few. What is “law” in my neighborhood? Is this a parking zone and if so, which parking permit is valid for it? Will the city administration also inform us of the affected citizens? How much does the parking pass cost us? Or is hanging signs in Heilbronn now a kind of popular sport that can be practiced by every citizen?
Unfortunately, I'm afraid that the content of Heilbronn signs is no longer important - our city entrance signs can serve as a good example - and that they will be attached wherever there is just space for a sign. You can do that too - but you don't have to!
