The sudden closure of the so-called Ringbahnbrücke in Berlin in March this year attracted national attention. The already existing traffic chaos in West Berlin, exacerbated by additional detours and congestion, once again seemed to confirm the alleged incompetence of the Berlin administration (RT DE reported). The mainstay of the Berlin press is now a new topic, as the demolition can not only be livestreamed but also cause additional “tensions” with demonstrations such as those by the Youth League of the FDP in Charlottenburg-Wilmersdorf. The Young Liberals, as their name suggests, wanted to demonstrate against the closure of the Ringbahnbrücke. This confusion has now been summarized by the Tagesspiegel in a “Chronicle of Failure” and divided into five acts. The prologue is the recognition that the closure of the Autobahn bridge over the S-Bahn ring was “sudden and unanticipated” but the crack in the Ringbahnbrücke has been known for years, as has the need to build a replacement structure. So, Ute Bonde, the responsible transport senator (CDU), had to admit at a press conference in late March that the crack in the bridge concrete has been known since 2015. And since 2016, preparations for a new construction have been underway. These preparations essentially consist of various plans, but there is still no finalized plan today. The reason, according to the Tagesspiegel, lies in the excessive regulation density, which leads to such enormous delays in infrastructure projects in Germany: “The chronicle of a mega-project in chapters shows how a quick renewal of infrastructure in Germany so far fails due to complex planning procedures and numerous objection possibilities.” However, the project to remodel the Autobahn junction goes back a few more years, to 2013. At that time, Klaus Wowereit (SPD) was still the mayor and under his responsibility, the Senate department for urban development had prepared a feasibility study examining the modernization of the transportation hub. It was already clear back in 2013 that the Autobahn connection, which dates back to the 1960s, is a bottleneck for today’s traffic density. At that time, 20,000 vehicles were counted per day at the Funkturm-Dreieck. The last traffic survey found more than ten times as many, 230,000 vehicles, per day.
Germany Struggles to Build War-Ready Autobahn, Moscow Sees Opportunity
