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CLIMATE

Part of central Berlin set to be closed to traffic for six months

A section of one of the capital's busiest streets will be car-free for six months in an experiment aimed at attracting more pedestrians and cyclists to the area.

Published: 5 March 2020 13:58 CET
Updated: 5 March 2020 15:47 CET
Part of central Berlin set to be closed to traffic for six months
Friedrichstraße in Berlin. Photo: DPA

The pilot project will see a large part of Friedrichstraße, in the Mitte district, closed to traffic.

From the beginning of June until the end of November this year, a car-free section between Leipziger Strasse and Französische Strasse is planned, as well as a 'traffic-calmed' area at Checkpoint Charlie.

The aim is to find out what effects this will have on pedestrian, bicycle, car and delivery traffic in the area and what users of Friedrichstraße will gain from it.

The street forms part of the city's main shopping district and is a magnet for tourists.

Berlin's local government presented the plans for the first time to residents, businesses and other interested parties on Wednesday.

They are to be analysed and discussed afterwards. As reported by the Berliner Morgenpost, the project also aims to make the sidewalks (pavements) twice as wide as they are currently.

Meanwhile, bicycle lanes will also be widened out.

According to the Berlin Senate, the aim of the traffic experiment is to increase the attractiveness of Friedrichstraße – for Berliners and tourists – and also to strengthen the city's trade and retail sectors by increasing footfall.

The traffic initiative Changing Cities welcomed the news.

“We are very pleased that by making Friedrichstraße, more attractive, ecological issues and the reorganisation of commercial traffic is also being addressed,” Stefan Lehmkühler said. 

But not everyone is happy.

Oliver Friederici, transport policy spokesman for the Berlin CDU faction, warned against a hasty closure of the street, saying residents and businesses needed to be more involved with the proposals.

READ ALSO: Berlin the latest German city to experiment with going car-free

The move isn't the first time that the idea of pedestrians reclaiming the streets of Berlin, and other cities in Germany, has been discussed.

In 2018 Friedrichstraße was closed to traffic for several hours in December and there have been several

Traffic was stopped at the nearby Brandenburg Gate in 2002, while plans were announced in 2017 to restrict traffic on Unter Den Linden from 2019. Hamburg has also considered making areas of the city car free in the not-too-distant future. 

The Berliner Morgenpost reported previously that the Berlin Senate had recommended banning vehicle traffic around the Checkpoint Charlie section of Friedrichstraße – only a few hundred metres south – for safety reasons. 

More than 26,000 foot crossings are made across the street in the Checkpoint Charlie area daily, with restrictions recommended to all traffic other than taxis, bicycles and night buses.

Previous plans have included turning Friedrichstraße into a 'Sunday Shopping Street' by closing it to vehicle traffic on Sundays.

Vocabulary

Car-free – autofrei

Traffic-calmed sector – (der) verkehrsberuhigter Bereich

Pavements/sidewalks – (die) Gehwege

Senate administration – (die) Senatsverwaltung

We're aiming to help our readers improve their German by translating vocabulary from some of our news stories. Did you find this article useful? Let us know.

 

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CLIMATE

Central and southern Italy brace for storms and heavy snow

Storms and snowfall are forecast across much of central and southern Italy over the next few days, according to weather reports.

Published: 29 November 2021 15:13 CET
Snow is forecast in the hills of much of central and southern Italy.
Snow is forecast in the hills of much of central and southern Italy. Photo: Miguel MEDINA / AFP

Italy’s Civil Protection Department on Monday issued ‘orange’ alerts for bad weather along Campania’s Tyrrhenian coastline and the western part of Calabria, while Sicily, Basilicata, Lazio, Molise, Umbria, Abruzzo, central-western Sardinia, and the remaining areas of Campania and Calabria are under a lower-level ‘yellow’ weather warning.

The European Centre for Medium-Range Weather Forecasts is warning Italy’s central-southern regions to prepare for a blast of polar air from the Arctic Circle that will bring heavy snowfall, rain and storms, reports national weather forecaster Il Meteo.

The village of Grotte di Castro in the province of Viterbo, two hours’ drive north of Rome, mountainous parts of Sardinia, and much of the province of Campobasso in the central-eastern region of Molise were already blanketed in snow on Monday morning.

The department is responsible for predicting, preventing and managing emergency events across the country, and uses a green, yellow, orange and red graded colour coding system for weather safety reports.

An orange alert signifies a heavy rainfall, landslide and flood risk, while a yellow alert warns of localised heavy and potentially dangerous rainfall.

The current meteorological conditions mean that snow is expected to reach unusually low altitudes of around 450-500 metres, with flakes already falling thickly on parts of the southern-central Apennines mountain range at 500-700 metres altitude.

The hills of Marche, Abruzzo, Molise, Lazio, Sardinia, Campania, Calabria and Basilicata are likely to see heavy snow around the 500m mark, while areas at an altitude of 1000m or higher will see between 50-60 cm of fresh snow.

Affected parts of the country could see 50-60cm of snowfall.

Affected parts of the country could see 50-60cm of snowfall. Photo: Vincenzo PINTO /AFP

In areas where the snow is unlikely to reach, heavy rains and thunderstorms are anticipated, with rain forecast throughout Sardinia, Campania, Calabria and Lazio, reports Il Meteo.

Strong winds are forecast over the whole country, with the island regions of Sicily and Sardinia facing windspeeds of over 100km/hour and the risk of storm surges, according to the national newspaper La Repubblica.

READ ALSO: Climate crisis: The Italian cities worst affected by flooding and heatwaves

The north of the country, meanwhile, will see sun but low temperatures of below 0°C at night in many areas, including across much of the Po Valley.

While conditions are expected to stabilise on Tuesday, cold currents from Northern Europe are forecast to trigger another wave of bad weather on Wednesday and Thursday, with Sardinia and Italy’s western coastline again at risk of storms and heavy rainfall that will move up towards Lombardy, Emilia Romagna and Veneto in the north.

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