There are practically no salsa dancers to be seen on gray, cold winter weekends.

Only now and then does a small group meet to move smoothly to Latino music - for example on New Year's Eve on the Bockenheim campus.

But actually those who met by the hundreds on the banks of the Main in summer are waiting for spring, for the first warmer evenings.

However, they will already be interested in whether the city will continue to offer them the opportunity to dance in an attractive place with the smoothest possible flooring.

Mechthild Harting

Editor in the Rhein-Main-Zeitung.

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The good news first: The new city government can well imagine that the community will gather at the Hauptwache in the future - on the area in front of the Katharinenkirche. They want to enable temporary uses around the main guard anyway, says Marcus Gwechenberger from the planning department. After all, the Roman coalition wants to revitalize the inner city, which is particularly suffering from the pandemic, with activities and non-commercial offers. Gwechenberger thinks that the Hauptwache would “probably not be a bad place for the dancers either”, after all there are no residents there who are bothered by loud music. The place is centrally located in the city, is easily accessible by public transport, and toilets are also nearby. Gwechenberger announces that he will approach the dancers in February at the latest,to discuss the idea with them.

Jumas Medoff, chairman of the local foreigners' association, came up with the suggestion to take a closer look at the main guard.

He has been looking after the dancers since the summer and is actively looking for a place for them.

The place that the community had chosen as the most suitable was the Philipp-Holzmann-Weg in front of the European Central Bank in Ostend.

Because the light concrete floor there, at the foot of the ECB, is, according to the dancers, wonderfully suitable for both salsa and merengue.

However, the place is part of the memorial, which commemorates the deportation of the Jews from Frankfurt during the Nazi era.

Quotes embedded in the floor testify to the horrors of the deportation.

From 1941 onwards, thousands of people were sent to death camps from the former wholesale market hall, which is now part of the European Central Bank.

No Christmas peace in the dance scene

The Jewish community reacted with dismay to the dance meetings and eventually the city issued a ban.

While the cultural office began to invite dancers, DJs, the Jewish community and other offices to a round table, Medoff himself took the initiative.

After discussions with the Goethe University, he was able to make the dancers an offer to temporarily use space on the old Bockenheim campus within a very short time.

This place is well received by some of the Latin dancers, as the meeting on Silversternacht showed. Others stayed near the ECB and moved on towards the Main, from then on danced under the Deutschherrnbrücke, in the midst of pedestrians who were walking between the Hafenpark and the banks of the Main. Still others paused and would probably have waited happily for spring had it not been known before Christmas that the head of the legal department Annette Rinn (FDP) has included the ban on dancing in front of the ECB in the ordinance on hazard prevention.

As a result, there was no longer any question of Christmas peace in the dance scene. Many outraged on social media. “Of all things, the FDP” was the most harmless thing that could be read. The spectrum ranged from displeasure about the actions of the city to anti-Semitic statements. There was talk of "Basta politics", also that the city was probably acting in favor of the bar and club owners and was not interested in the around 700 salsa fans. "The dancers are frustrated," said one of the DJs.

The mood has been better since this week, when the news began to circulate that the Hauptwache could become the new meeting point. But not everyone is enthusiastic: “You dance like you're on a plate,” complains one; there are too many "disruptive factors such as passers-by, traffic and noise". Others miss free parking spaces. After all, the dancers come from all over the Rhine-Main area. Still others are bothered by the fact that the main guard is "full of dubious figures". Others, however, are ready to try it out: “Hauptwache? I think that's great, ”says a dancer. Actually, all you need is a good floor, music and dancers - “that’s okay”.

Medoff is convinced that he has found a good place in the long term in the Hauptwache.

“What could be better than this place?” It couldn't be more centrally located, the Hauptwache will be upgraded in this way, and the city will give the dancers the signal that they are enriching Frankfurt's cultural landscape.

The Latin dance with its diversity, "that fits into the picture, fits into our city".

And the opportunity to dance on the Bockenheim campus or under the Deutschherrnbrücke on the Main will stay that way.