Kreuzberg cycle paths for all of Berlin ?: Green push to disempower the districts meets with divided echo – Berlin

The numbers are alarming: In 2020, too, there were 7908 bicycle accidents on Berlin’s streets. The number of people who get on the saddle every day is increasing in the capital, but the necessary infrastructure, wide cycle paths and safe crossings are not growing at the same pace even in the fifth year after Regine Günther took office.

In order to make faster progress on important traffic issues, especially in the expansion of cycle paths, Antje Kapek, leader of the Green Party, is now calling for the districts to be disempowered on these issues. “One of the keys is the administration and the question of whether we are consolidating competencies at the state level,” said Kapek in an interview with Tagesspiegel – and the response was mixed.

The numbers for the expansion of cycle paths looked modest recently. In the first half of this year, only 9.36 kilometers of new bicycle traffic facilities have been built, according to the answer from the Senate Traffic Administration In response to a request from MP Sven Kohlmeier (SPD) which is available in advance to the daily mirror. In 2020, a total of 48.15 kilometers of new cycle paths were built, of which, at 25 kilometers, more than half were initially created as a pop-up version.

The discrepancy between the districts is striking. While Friedrichshain-Kreuzberg built around 14 kilometers, including pop-up cycle paths, in 2020, other districts come to less than 2000 meters. According to the Senate Traffic Administration, only 520 meters of new cycle paths have been created in Reinickendorf. For Spandau and Tempelhof-Schöneberg not one meter is specified.

Monika Herrmann: We could take over the expansion of cycle paths in Berlin

In view of such numbers, ideas to bundle cycle route planning in one place have existed for a long time. Most recently, the Changing Cities initiative called for a task force from the Senate Transport Administration. During these considerations, the name of the head of the Friedrichshain-Kreuzberg road and green space department comes up again and again. He and his team, who are currently converting the district at lightning speed, could in future be responsible for planning cycle paths for all of Berlin.

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The district mayor of Friedrichshain-Kreuzberg Monika Herrmann is the advocate of bundling cycle path planning for the main roads. “If we want to implement the traffic turnaround, then that definitely makes sense in the main transport network,” she said. The Senate Administration is currently ordering a measure, but the districts would then have to implement it. “These are moments of ping-pong,” said Herrmann.

However, Herrmann is critical of a new unit at the Senate level for this purpose. “By the time we set up a new administrative unit at the Senate Traffic Administration and make it work, the next legislative period will already be over.” Instead, your district could take over the construction of cycle paths throughout Berlin. There are always tasks that one district carries out on behalf of the other, said Herrmann. Lichtenberg, for example, takes care of parked junk cars across the city.

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At the weekend, MEP Sven Kohlmeier was also open to a more centralized design, if this would improve what, in his opinion, Senator of Transport Günther’s record on cycle path construction, would improve. “If the responsibilities are the problem, then the senator has to come to the House of Representatives and say I need more powers.” Parliament would have done something then too. The Greens already made a similar proposal in the coalition negotiations in 2016. At that time, however, they failed, among other things, because of the opposition of the SPD.

Demand from Neukölln for more staff

Neukölln’s district mayor Martin Hikel (SPD) is critical of Kapek and Herrmann’s proposals. “I see the demand for centralization as a reflex, because you are not meeting the high expectations of the cyclists inside and are now trying to act quickly.” The idea sounds half-baked, said Hikel: “I have too many question marks about what they are Road construction load concerns. Who does the project coordination, who looks after the construction companies? ”He himself rates the districts’ balance sheet, especially his own, less badly. “The districts have put a lot on the street where they can.”

However, the Mobility Act aroused expectations that everything would change overnight. Hermannstrasse shows that this is not the case. “You misunderstood what mammoth task it is sometimes,” said the Neukölln district mayor. Most sustainable if the districts got more staff for traffic planning.

The transport policy spokesman for the FDP parliamentary group, Henner Schmidt, sees it similarly. “The districts and the BVVs know the local problems better and are closer to the people, which enables them to optimize planning on site.” The Greens, on the other hand, are now striving to transfer their “ideological traffic planning” to all districts, said Schmidt. “It would be better to finally equip the districts better so that they can do their job properly.”

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