Darmstadt Deletes Statement on Urgent Court Decision regarding Schlossgrabenfest Noise Levels

In the course of proceedings before the administrative court in Darmstadt, the city deleted a statement on an urgent decision by the court on the Schlossgrabenfest.

Mayor Jochen Partsch (Greens) and Head of Public Order Paul Georg Wandrey (CDU) have undertaken in the course of urgent proceedings before the Darmstadt Administrative Court to refrain from making a statement about the plaintiffs against the noise emissions at the Schlossgrabenfest, which will last until Sunday.

On Thursday afternoon, the mayor and the city council issued a joint statement on the lawsuit against the volume at the Schlossgrabenfest after 10 p.m. With reference to the court decision, the two full-time members of the magistrate had assumed that the plaintiffs wanted to “prevent this peaceful and happy celebration in the last few meters”. But this is not the case.

Schlossgrabenfest Darmstadt: administrative court decides on noise level

Tobias Schwab, the spokesman for the Darmstadt Administrative Court, confirmed at the request of FR that preventing the Schlossgrabenfest was not the intention of the urgent application, which the 6th Chamber of the Administrative Court, which is responsible for immission control law, had partially granted.

The chamber had decided that the city had to issue a corresponding order to the music festival’s organizers to ensure that the limit values ​​for rare events laid down in the leisure noise guideline of the federal/state working group for immission control were applied to one applicant who lives near the festival site , would have to be complied with.

Darmstadt: City deletes notification of Schlossgrabenfest decision

The Darmstadt lawyer Christian Kramarz described the quote from Partsch and Wandrey published in the city’s press release as a “malicious false claim”.

The city, according to the lawyer, “remedyed the application for the removal and omission of the false allegation on Friday and deleted the corresponding press release in the press portal of the city of Darmstadt”. In the coming week, his clients will also be sent a corresponding cease-and-desist declaration.

Green politician Krämer: urgent decision “manifests the bourgeois philistinism”

Philip Krämer (Greens), member of the Bundestag and city councilor who lives in Darmstadt, said in a statement about the administrative court’s urgent decision on the noise limit values ​​that he considered them “problematic because they manifested bourgeois philistinism”. He could only encourage the city to lodge a complaint with the Hessian Administrative Court against the urgent decision.

The city, the organizers of the Schlossgrabenfest, Stage Groove Festival GmbH, and one of the plaintiffs are still examining whether to lodge a complaint against the urgent decision. You have two weeks to do this.

Schlossgrabenfest is “a cultural magnet in Darmstadt”

For the Greens member of the Bundestag, Krämer, the Schlossgrabenfest has been an event for years that “brings all of southern Hesse together and is a cultural magnet in Darmstadt”. It would therefore be good, according to Krämer, to get together with everyone involved after this year’s Schlossgrabenfest and to develop a concept that, if possible, takes all interests into account.

Thiemo Gutfried, one of the two managing directors of Stage Groove Festival GmbH, told FR on Friday that they are now actively seeking dialogue with the plaintiffs in order to meet their need for protection. Gutfried emphasized that there are no noise restrictions for the festival site itself.

Schlossgrabenfest Darmstadt: the organizer has noise measured

The noise level must be observed at the plaintiff’s apartment. However, 70 decibels had already been measured there before the festival began because the apartment was near a busy road. On Friday, neither the city nor Managing Director Gutfried had the current noise values ​​measured by a specialist company from the previous evening.

23 years ago, a resident of Darmstadt’s market square obtained a decision from the Hessian Administrative Court to limit noise. The city’s current regulatory order to the event company also states that the noise emissions caused by the music performances must not exceed the assessment level in front of the windows of the corresponding property facing the market square of 65 decibels.

In order to meet the residents’ need for protection, there will be no music events on the market square and the adjacent Friedensplatz during the Schlossgrabenfest.