The situation is tricky.

There is no way around a new recycling center for the city of Bad Homburg.

However, the planned location in the district of Ober-Eschbach met with rejection there.

Nevertheless, on Tuesday evening, a large majority of the city councilors in the building committee voted against the Bürgerliste Bad Homburg (BLB) and the Greens abstaining in favor of continuing the preparations.

The local council voted unanimously against the proposal in mid-March.

Bernhard Biener

Correspondent for the Rhein-Main-Zeitung for the Hochtaunus district.

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So far there have been two collection points in the spa town for things that don't fit in the bin.

The recycling center on Georg-Schaeffler-Straße next to the district office and opposite the Hochtaunus clinics is mainly responsible for this.

However, it no longer meets the requirements of the regional council, which only tolerates continued operation.

"There are already restrictions," said waste consultant Daniela Münzing in the committee.

Waste oil, old tires, refrigerators, certain types of wood and old glass are no longer accepted.

In the future, wood, metal and hard plastic will have to be collected separately from bulky waste because of recycling.

"New environmental laws are added almost every month," said Munzing.

An expansion at the current location fails not only because of the lack of space for the recycling center itself. Its area is also used by the neighboring depot, which is actually too small for the 53 city buses stationed there.

At the latest with the planned introduction of electric buses including charging infrastructure, which is associated with more vehicles, an expansion of the depot will be necessary.

Long traffic jams at peak times

A branch of the recycling center is located in the district of Ober-Eschbach, right next to the Bad Homburg sewage treatment plant.

He can't stay there either because the sewage treatment plant is being expanded at a cost of millions.

The area has already been cleared.

The Ober-Eschbach collection point is therefore to be moved a few meters further to the other side of the Am Sauereck road and be expanded into a recycling center for the entire city.

The city bought the necessary property for 1.2 million euros.

So far, the Ober-Eschbach recycling center has been open on four half-days.

At peak times, cars back up in front of it, no different than at the main recycling center on Georg-Schaeffler-Strasse.

Which is why the local advisory board can base its rejection, which is primarily based on the volume of traffic, on its own view.

Especially since the southern and eastern ring, actually a bypass, is already overloaded at peak times.

If the long-planned improvements are made, the city planners still consider the access to the planned new recycling center via the Massenheimer Weg to be efficient enough.

City councilor Lucia Lewalter-Schoor (SPD) put the number of deliveries to the two recycling centers at 200 to a maximum of 600 a day in the building committee.

Green cuttings account for the largest volume by a clear margin.

In order to relieve the new recycling center, it should no longer be accepted there.

Instead, four new green corners are planned across the city.

In addition, the green waste should be picked up directly from households more frequently, ten times a year.

The committee rejected the application submitted by Armin Johnert (BLB) to leave individual waste fractions on Georg-Schaeffler-Straße at the previous recycling center in order to equalize traffic.

"That means more traffic, because when in doubt, people have to go to two locations," said Lewalter-Schoor.

"We're fed up"

Eva Wingler's (Green Party) suggestion that the issue should be postponed to a round of meetings in order to once again deal intensively with the arguments for and against the various locations examined also failed to find a majority.

According to the head of urban planning, Holger Heinze, there are several reasons against the former Hewlett-Packard building on the south campus, which she also brought into play and which is currently being used as a vaccination center.

It was purchased at great expense by a private investor and the development plan would have to be changed.

"That would delay the expansion of the sewage treatment plant for years," added Lewalter-Schoor.

Local advisory board member Wolfgang Laupus (SPD) also spoke up in the building committee, criticizing the number of inhabitants used as a basis for the new recycling center as being too low.

Not all new developments were included.

An accusation that waste consultant Munzing rejected.

The already generous estimate of 5,000 new residents was doubled to 10,000 as a precaution.

But Laupus also saw that not all location variants had been adequately examined and referred to the ten-year discussion about the congested southern ring road.

"We're fed up," he said of the rejection across all local council groups.

This changed the approval of their own party friends in the committee just as little as it did with the CDU.