A "Green Centre" for the Weststadt area of the city
(Mecklenburg-Vorpommern)
Photography: raum + prozess
Parchim (pop. 19,000), with its medieval old town, is in the southwest of Mecklenburg-Western Pommerania, around 40km southeast of the federal state capital of Schwerin and 100km south of Rostock. The population decline in the city was 6.7% between 1994 and 2003. This trend is continuing.
The 'Weststadt' housing estate with its around 5,400 residents is on the urban fringe and is Parchim's largest prefabricated concrete block estate with its 50 hectares and almost 3,500 flats. It was built in an industrial five-storey style between 1968 and 1988 and was supplemented by new buildings after 1990. Two thirds of the housing stock belongs to the city housing association WOBAU. There is a high level of unoccupied housing (12.2% vacant, of which 10.5% is long-term vacant). Even the good location (with regard to access to open spaces, transport connections) and the implementation of various measures (privatisation of residential space, modernisation, improvement of the living environment, development of new shopping locations) have not been able to stop the loss of residents and could not stabilise the neighbourhood. The population of the 'Weststadt' district declined by 33% between 1994 and 2003.
Source: Stadtbauamt Parchim
Many conversion measures have already been implemented in this planning area corresponding to the urban development framework plan of 1996 for streets, courtyards and public open spaces.
Appropriate improvements were implemented up to the end of 2002 with money from the living environment programme. Furthermore, the housing associations have carried out modernisation and redevelopment work on the housing blocks. There has been deconstruction and demolition work regarding both the housing and the infrastructure. Nevertheless, the neighbourhood still has structural, functional and design shortcomings.
The 2004 update of the framework plan defines what is sensible to ensure the housing function in good quality surroundings as a medium-term orientation for many individual actions which cannot yet be specified in detail. This concerns the reduction of vacant flats while simultaneously enhancing sustainable stocks. The living environment improvements intended for this are accompanied by demolition and deconstruction and the erection of new housing and infrastructure. Thus, the deconstruction concept involves a reduction of the housing stock by 834 flats and also the deconstruction of streets up to the year 2010.
A "Green Centre" is coming into being on areas of the neighbourhood where residential buildings and infrastructure once stood or still stand. It improves the transition to the bordering landscape area and the green area quality in the estate.
| Year | Event |
|---|---|
| 1996 | Town representative resolution on framework plan "Weststadt - Improvement of the Living Environment" |
| 2002 | Integriertes Stadtentwicklungskonzept (ISEK) - Integrated Town Development Concept |
| 2004 | Update of the framework plan |
| 2004 | Open space concept "Green Centre" |
Photography: raum + prozess
Photography: raum + prozess
Photography: raum + prozess
As part of the implementation of the Integrated Town Development Concept (ISEK) in Parchim, the landscaping of the Green Centre is a central building block for the enhancement of the Weststadt housing location. The deconstruction of the large housing estate is not taking place at the town fringe, as is often the case in other cities, but instead in the centre of the settlement. This gives the urban district new qualities in the form of a Green Centre
The projekt site ist to be found at postal code: 19370 - town: Parchim - street: Hans-Beimler-Straße 10.
Record inserted on 27.06.2007 by the Federal Institute for Research on Building, Urban Affairs and Spatial Development (BBSR) within the Federal Office for Building and Regional Planning (BBR).
Last update: 22.08.2008
