It's an exciting project that's being planned right now: On more than 20,000 square meters, the Mainuferpromenade is to be connected with the Hafenpark and the GrünGürtel. Before the end of last year, Rosemarie Heilig, Head of the Environment Department, gave the green light in the Magistrate's Office to close the gap in the Mainuferpromenade between the Oosten, the eastern entrance to the European Central Bank and the Hafenpark. This means that the project is not yet in the bag, but if the city council now also gives its approval, the green spaces department can begin to create a green space of more than 20,000 square metres on the site, combining the best of the Mainufer and GrünGürtel.
Frankfurters can look forward not only to a very long bench with harbour-style wooden supports. Nature is also getting its due. For example, wall lizards will get gravel beds along the ECB fence and the harbour railway tracks, and bats will get a hotel under the listed Deutschherrn Bridge.
"The task has definitely challenged us in terms of planning," explained Stephan Heldmann, the head of the Parks Department. For it is not only a question of extending the waterfront promenade from the Ruhrort shipyard with the Oosten to the harbour park. The security facilities of the European Central Bank, which extend directly to the banks of the Main, must also be incorporated as inconspicuously as possible. The space under the large railway arch bridge can only be designed as a green area with the help of an irrigation system, of course it will be fed with Main water.
That's not all. The connection to the GrünGürtel and the memorial for Frankfurt's Jewish citizens deported to concentration camps are also included in the planning. "This is where the urban Mainufer and Frankfurt's large GrünGürtel natural area intersect, and at the same time it is a place with history," Heldmann said. The transition to the GrünGürtel is to be made tangible through a network of smaller paths and a grove-like tree planting, among other things.
With the construction and financing bill, the magistrate has approved a total of almost 3.7 million euros for the green space, the majority of which will be invested in 2018. If all goes to plan, work can begin this summer. In the early summer of 2019, Frankfurt residents will then be able to get to Hafenpark, Deutschherrnbrücke or the Philipp-Holzmann-Weg green space without a bumpy ride. We are excited and already looking forward to Frankfurt becoming a little bit greener
