Controversy Surrounding Construction of Nordtangente Tram in München: Calls to Halt the Project Due to Mistakes and Opposition

München – On their website, the municipal utilities call the Nordtangente tram a “central building block” for the mobility transition. One day you should take it from Elisabethplatz through the English Garden to the Johanneskirchen S-Bahn stop. The plans for the last section are furthest along. The tram is scheduled to run through Johanneskirchner Straße by the end of 2025. The municipal utilities are already starting construction preparations. Next week they want to cut down trees and then lay pipes for water, electricity and district heating.

But the municipal utilities may have been a bit hasty. At least CSU state parliament member Robert Brannekämper and lawyer Benno Ziegler are convinced of this. You are currently lobbying the government of Upper Bavaria to force the municipal utilities to stop the construction site. Both assume that the municipal utilities have made mistakes – for example in the investigations into noise protection. Why do they want to put the project on hold?

150 trees have to be felled for the route of the north tangent

“This is disaster planning,” says Brannekämper at a press conference that he arranged with lawyer Ziegler. He represents the residents in 150 apartments who live on Freischützstrasse near the new route.

The route will branch off from the existing line on Cosimastraße into Johanneskirchner Straße and connect to the Johanneskirchen S-Bahn station. The route is around 700 meters long – and, according to the municipal utilities, costs 58.5 million euros. There is a bus there and it takes about ten minutes to walk. In total, almost 150 trees have to be felled for the route. The municipal utilities plan to replant 139 trees. These are all arguments against the route for the CSU parliamentary group in the town hall.

“Perplexed and sad”: Residents rehearse a rebellion against the tram north bypass

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In the last few months there has been massive protest from residents, says Brannekämper. In addition, the connection to the S-Bahn station is actually getting worse: today the path from the bus stop to the S-Bahn is only 25 meters long. From the tram turning loop to the track it is later 160 meters. The municipal utilities confirm these distances. However, there are savings in travel time.

Noise protection report: Have the Munich municipal utilities made mistakes?

The lawyer also accuses the municipal utilities of errors in the noise protection report: When conducting the noise analysis, the municipal utilities did not take into account the existing noise pollution from the S-Bahn, says Ziegler. In his opinion, the municipal utilities should have added this value and the expected noise. “And then we are on the threshold of a health risk,” he says.

In fact, the municipal utilities have now also determined that the report is “incorrect,” as they responded to a query from AZ. They say they will correct it.

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CSU man Robert Brannekämper wants to stop the construction of the northern tangent in Munich

And Brannekämper and the lawyer believe they have identified another violation of the law: the municipal utilities are already starting work on the construction site, but the planning approval process has not yet been completed. So there is still no final permission from the government of Upper Bavaria.

“I will therefore involve the district president so that he can instruct the city to stop the project,” announces Brannekämper. Does he have a chance? In response to an AZ query, the government of Upper Bavaria said: “Construction preparation measures for a project that has not yet been approved are not per se inadmissible.” So not necessarily allowed either.