That doesn't happen very often: In 1991 the city councilors of Frankfurt unanimously decided to "secure and develop the free areas around the core city as a 'green belt of Frankfurt' in the long term".
And local politics kept its word.
By and large, at least.
Mechthild Harting
Editor in the Rhein-Main-Zeitung.
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In the past 30 years it has protected the green ring around the city from building despite the enormous growth of the Main metropolis and as a "habitat for plants and animals, partly for those that are already rare or threatened with extinction" and for them Bringing people to life - as it was laid down in the Green Belt Charter in 1991.
Where action was nevertheless taken, a piece of new green belt had to be created elsewhere in order to keep the area the same overall.
That too was set by the politicians 30 years ago.
Most of the time, the intervention has even been overcompensated, says Thomas Hartmanshenn, head of the Green Belt project group, in which urban planning, environmental and green space officials work together.
An example of such an intervention is the new use of the horse racing track area in the Niederrad district, which was completely in the green belt - because it does not have to consist of meadows and fields, it can also be gardens, for example, but the areas must not be sealed. The DFB Academy is currently being built in the southern part of the racetrack grounds. In order to compensate for the soil that the extensive building devours, the northern part of the racetrack area, which is to be called Bürgerpark Süd, with the adjacent Elli-Lucht-Park and the banks of the Main between Niederräder Bridge and Main-Neckar Bridge will be part of the green belt.
"The green belt is an absolute success," say those who are responsible for nature conservation and open space planning, not only in Frankfurt today.
It is the thought of the future in the decision made 30 years ago that impresses them: They are convinced that, although there is more talk than seldom before about the protection of nature, about securing groundwater and cold air, it is no longer manage to put at least a third of the city's area, more precisely around 8,000 hectares, under protection
Significance especially shown in the pandemic
In 1992 the first green belt leisure map appeared, with some cycling and hiking trails and excursion destinations. There is now a 64-kilometer circular cycle path and a somewhat longer circular hiking path, on which you can explore the entire green belt with its excursion destinations: from the Berger Hang over the Niddatal to the mouth of the river in the Main and on by ferry in Höchst over to Schwanheim, to the nature reserve Schwanheimer Düne, further through the city forest to the herb fields for the green sauce in Oberrad, over the Ostpark back up to the Berger Höhe.
And the green belt has evolved, new things have been added, such as the old airfield in Bonames, the abandoned weir in Höchst, which offers the Frankfurters a stretch of beach with a mountain brook feeling, the port park in Ostend, the Fechenheimer Mainbogen, which in parts becomes a floodplain landscape.
The corona pandemic at the latest has made it clear how valuable such a green ring is for a city that now has almost 760,000 inhabitants and a relatively small area, especially since residents of the surrounding area also like to use it. So many have been in the green belt in the past few months that the city of Frankfurt has started to use so-called landscape guides at the “hotspots”, who explain to the citizens how to behave so that the green belt becomes a space for the people, but just can also be and remain one for plants and animals.