On December 28th, Dresden’s mayor issued a new general decree that stipulates a ban on firecrackers on December 31st / January 1st in the city. The ban applies throughout the city on all public and private areas and includes pyrotechnic objects of category 2 and higher according to the explosives law. This means that firecrackers, rockets and similar fireworks may neither be carried nor burned on the days mentioned.
It seems all the more astonishing that the Stadtreinigung Dresden GmbH, a municipal subsidiary, wants to “take care of order and cleanliness in Dresden city center” on New Year’s Day. According to the press release, “22 employees will be deployed with four sweepers, two waste-paper basket vehicles and five transporters for general inspection and cleaning tasks”.
That is praiseworthy, but also means that Mayor Dirk Hilbert doesn’t quite trust the people of Dresden when it comes to not igniting various firecrackers. Frank Siebert, managing director of Stadtreinigung Dresden, seems to be only mutedly optimistic: “We are expecting a far lower amount of waste than in previous years, but we are prepared for all eventualities”.
In any case, he sends his employees on January 1st from 7 a.m. to 1 p.m. on inspection and cleaning rounds, primarily in the city center. “The New Year’s Eve rubbish will be removed from the other areas that are cleaned by the SRD in accordance with the statutes on behalf of the city in the course of the next regular cleaning.” Should Dresden, however, still have to deal with a winter and cold snap, then “the winter service in the city area must first be covered”.
As a reminder: On normal New Year’s Eve days or the day after, the hard-working colleagues from city cleaning have collected an average of 25 tons of New Year’s Eve waste in recent years.
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