The city of Maintal has had an identity problem for a long time.

In the course of the regional reform, it was formed from four districts that could not be more different.

Dörnigheim is located on the beautiful banks of the Main and is more urban in character, as is Bischofsheim, which has many more high-rise buildings.

Hochstadt with its meadow orchards is an idyllic place, while Wachenbuchen has rural features.

However, the lack of a center and the great diversity should not hide the fact that Maintal, with 40,000 inhabitants, is the most important city in the east of the Rhine-Main area after Hanau and an important neighbor of Frankfurt.

The two cities have grown ever closer together, although Maintal has not become Frankfurt's bedroom community.

Rather, the city has developed self-confidently.

For the past six years, this is mainly thanks to the non-party mayor Monika Böttcher, who has achieved a lot despite the difficult political situation.

Eyesore are eliminated

This did not always go according to the exact ideas of the full-time magistrate, time and again the city councilors threw a spanner in the works or modified templates according to their ideas.

Nevertheless, Maintal is progressing.

A city in this position will grow, there is no way around it.

Therefore, under the direction of Böttcher, a municipal real estate company was founded to create more affordable living space.

That is scarce in the Rhine-Main area, and Maintal also took in many refugee families who will need their own apartment in the foreseeable future.

Therefore, it is right to provide generously for new living space.

The inner development is placed before the consumption of outer surfaces, which also corresponds to the trend of the times.

At the same time, urban eyesores such as the "Opel-Eck" will be eliminated.

The growing importance of the city can definitely be expressed in the construction of a new swimming pool.

Böttcher would have liked the future Maintalbad to be one size smaller, but it is not her style to stand up against the city council majority without success in the foreseeable future.

Critics are right when they say that the development costs of the large-scale project represented a risk given the general uncertainty and in view of rising energy prices.

But what is not uncertain in the current times of crisis?

Maintal can think ahead.

After all, it won't be a fun pool with entrance fees that only the well-off can afford.