GERMANY: Deutsche Bahn has ruled out construction of a €400m maintenance and repair facility in the Nürnberg area for its growing fleet of ICE trainsets. Investigation of nearly 100 potential sites had been narrowed down to a single proposal as the best of three final options.
Now the chosen site at Feucht has also been excluded as detailed evaluation of the site eventually determined that permission to build the workshop would not be granted, even though the Mittelfranken local government had endorsed it as ‘spatially compatible’.
Confirming this on April 13, DB noted that the project could only have gone ahead if there had been ‘a compelling need for remedial work’, while clearance of any explosive ordnance would have been necessary as the site had been used during and after World War II for ammunition production and storage.
Klaus-Dieter Josel, DB Group Representative for Bayern, said that ‘regrettably the relevant conditions offer us no prospect of successful construction of a workshop in the Nürnberg area. We just could not find a suitable location for our workshop with many hundreds of high-quality industrial jobs. We sincerely regret that and thank all those who supported us in the project.’
Project Manager for DB Fernverkehr Carsten Burmeister noted that the search for a site had been ‘very thorough’ and that ‘the Mittelfranken government had confirmed that there are no brownfield sites or other obvious alternatives in the region. After more than two years of intensive work my team and I have no choice but to cease planning for an ICE workshop in the Nürnberg area.’ DB says it will now look at ‘alternative options’.
