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fromGregor Hashnik
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Four municipalities complain that the new railway line between Hanau and Fulda would cause them massive disadvantages. The railway rejects the allegations.
The municipalities of Bad Soden-Salmünster, Schlüchtern, Steinau (Main-Kinzig district) and Kalbach (Fulda district) have joined forces to influence Deutsche Bahn’s plans for the expansion and new line from Hanau to Fulda / Würzburg. On Wednesday they sharply criticized the regional planning procedure and, above all, the route variant IV, which is favored by the railway.
The variant runs through the Kinzig valley and the villages. They complain that the route would present them with serious problems and rely on an expert report by the traffic and environmental management office Regio Consult, which they commissioned. Accordingly, the railway did not take into account the high demand for new development areas in the municipalities and the schedules for them. Variant IV and the work for it would, according to the accusation, block the development of the settlement in some cases for more than 15 years and thus interfere with the municipal planning sovereignty. The noise pollution was not correctly determined, the route sometimes runs through high water and flood areas. The railway also disregarded former landfills and contaminated sites in the currently preferred variant.
Those affected have submitted a statement to the hearing authority, the Darmstadt Regional Council. It should ensure that the railway corrects the deficiencies in the plans and reinterprets them or terminates the procedure. The experts from Regio Consult come to the conclusion that variant VII, which runs along the edge of the Vogelsberg to the west of Wächtersbach, would be better “from a spatial planning and environmental point of view”, but also has considerable deficiencies.
The project
The railway line between Hanau and Gelnhausen four tracks will be built, the one between Gelnhausen and the Fulda area will be rebuilt. For the latter, the railway favors a route variant through the Kinzig valley, not far from the existing route.
additional Information gives up www.hanau-wuerzburg-fulda.de.
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Schlüchtern’s mayor Matthias Möller (non-party) complained about variant IV, especially the large bridges, the construction of which would damage his city. The municipalities would defend themselves against the “giant” railway and have a lot of staying power. Bad Soden-Salmünster’s town hall chief Dominik Brasch (non-party) emphasized that he was not fundamentally against the project, but the threatened grievances were unacceptable.
With the exception of Steinau, who has not yet made a parliamentary decision and therefore does not want to commit itself, all municipalities from the alliance are rejecting variant IV. There are also concerns about variant VII; a combination of variants V and VII is advocated for this. The latter leads from Gelnhausen to the north, along the Vogelsberg.
Wulf Hahn from Regio Consult accused Deutsche Bahn of a lack of conscientiousness and neutrality when assessing the options. He has never seen such “deficient documents” being submitted after such a long process. Möller demanded that the railway should fundamentally question the project, which was associated with “billions in costs” and “major hurdles”. In ten years there will be far fewer commuters, also because many people would then – as is now the case with the Corona crisis – work from home.
The railway had already rejected allegations, including those of negligence. You proceed conscientiously, objectively and transparently. Variant IV is currently the best solution “after weighing up all the advantages and disadvantages of the route variants examined”. It has a comparatively low impact on people and the environment, and it does best in terms of traffic and economy. Now it is the RP’s turn to examine, and some conflicts can still be resolved in further proceedings.
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