When a city receives the Unesco World Heritage title, it is immediately cheered politically.

After the title was announced, the Baden-Württemberg housing minister, Nicole Razavi, called on everyone to enjoy the joint success.

The Lord Mayor of Baden-Baden, Margret Mergen (both CDU), spoke of a happy day for her city after the announcement on Saturday.

Then there was champagne from the two-liter bottle.

Rudiger Soldt

Political correspondent in Baden-Württemberg.

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The title win is not at all due to a political initiative. The city and the housing ministry only accompanied the application; the initiative came from private citizens. In 1999, the then IHK manager Hans-Peter Mengele founded the “Freundeskreis Lichtentaler Allee” after hurricane Lothar uprooted some trees in the avenue, which is so important for the cityscape. Mengele later researched the Palais Biron, an urban villa designed by Auguste de Meuron in neo-baroque style. Mengele understood the cultural and historical importance of the city and some time later founded the “World Heritage Initiative”. In 2016, eleven of 45 European cities were selected, and in 2019 the city submitted an application of 1,500 pages. The initiative was significantly supported by the former director of Brenners Parkhotel,Frank Marrenbach.

What does the title mean politically?

Since the decision of the Unesco experts, most of the city center is now under World Heritage protection. These include, roughly speaking, the Festspielhaus, Lichtentaler Allee, the Kurhaus, the baths, the grand hotels and the hillside villas. The question now is what the title Baden-Baden will actually bring and what it means politically: The urban development statute does not have to be changed, and the city, which is not particularly solvent, does not initially face any financial burdens. "Part of our city center has been a listed building since 2009, and the area was expanded again in 2018," says Lisa Poetschki, head of the World Heritage Application Department. “That means that when we build something, the lower monument protection authority and the State Office for Monument Protection are always involved.We have a design advisory board for disputed cases between the building management and private investors. "

Even before the title was obtained, people in Baden-Baden agreed that they no longer wanted to tolerate standardized architecture when renovating villas.

That is why there are also design statutes for the villa districts.

"We will put investors on the curb more," says Poetschki.

"In the future, the public interest will count even more when renovating."

Baden-Baden needs a change in mobility

In addition, the urban planning problems should be looked at more closely in the future. Private investors often buy historically valuable buildings without being able to renovate them. The New Palace on the Florentinerberg has been falling into disrepair for years, the renovation of the “Europäische Hof” hotel did not progress for over 15 months because the investor was insolvent. Such construction problems will be discussed even more publicly in the future. In addition, there is still lively debate in Baden-Baden about when the city should be CO2-neutral and how much one wants to use wind energy. A majority of the CDU, Free Citizens, FDP and Free Voters do not want to build wind turbines in the city forest - tourists should only see the pure Black Forest from Leopoldsplatz or from the Kurhaus. Wind turbines should only be approved in the low-wind Rhine plain.

Many citizens and also the Greens, who form the strongest political group but do not have a majority, fear a sharp increase in day-to-day tourism after being awarded the title. Before the pandemic, the tourist office regularly counted one million overnight stays per year. "As a world cultural heritage city, Baden-Baden has a great opportunity to improve the quality of tourism," says the green member of the state parliament, Hans-Peter Behrens. “Just relying on quantity is of little use, because more day-to-day tourism increases the volume of traffic and is of little benefit to the hotel industry.” Baden-Baden needs a change in mobility. Like the President of the State Monuments Office, Claus Wolf, Behrens is of the opinion that wind turbines can be part of the cultural landscape in 30 years and that they do not necessarily limit the world heritage.“The expansion of wind energy can be reconciled with the increased demands on monument protection, otherwise the city cannot achieve the climate targets,” he says. The CDU member of the state parliament, Tobias Wald, sees it differently: “There are locations where there are more windy places.” There is currently no majority in the local council for wind turbines on the city's local mountain - the Merkur - and for the climate protection concept. “With the title, the World Heritage City of Baden-Baden has a great opportunity to improve the quality of tourism. Just relying on quantity is of little use, ”says the green member of the state parliament, Hans-Peter Behrens. Because day tourism increases the volume of traffic and does not bring any income to the hotel industry. Baden-Baden also needs a “mobility turnaround”.“The expansion of wind energy can be reconciled with the increased demands on monument protection, otherwise the city cannot achieve the climate targets,” he says. The CDU member of the state parliament, Tobias Wald, sees it differently: “There are more windy locations elsewhere.” He hopes for “upscale tourism”.

The head of the State Monuments Office, Claus Wolf, says the state has committed itself to protecting the world cultural heritage. "If there are any applications for the construction of wind turbines, we will therefore deal with them sensitively and carry out a visual space analysis." In 30 years, wind turbines would "naturally" be part of the cultural landscape. “Of course we cannot build a wind turbine behind the castle ruins in Baden-Baden. That must also be clear. ”In Baden-Baden, there is currently no majority in the municipal council for the construction of wind turbines on Merkur, the city's local mountain.