Restoring a 2000 year old city

For many years already, great care has been taken in the continuing restoration work on Regensburg's ancient buildings. This is an important factor in preserving the World Heritage site defined as "Old Town of Regensburg with Stadtamhof".

Since 1945 Regensburg has been the only preserved medieval metropolis in Germany. In the post-war years, this caused two main problems to arise in terms of preserving historic buildings: on the one hand, it was necessary to make the central city an attractive place, also from an economic point of view, and on the other hand, living conditions for residents in the old town needed to be improved. While other cities had to reconstruct whole war-destroyed areas with new buildings and new street layouts, in Regensburg it was necessary to restore existing residential quarters, many of which are centuries old.

In the 1950's, these twin tasks led to a conflict between city modernisation and preserving the ancient buildings. The restoration of Regensburg's old town, begun in the early 1950's, was considered a task of national importance. The German Town and Country Planning Academy's state committee for Bavaria developed appropriate guidelines in 1956/57. The goal was stated to preserve external walls and building proportions, and to use these as a basis for further planning. The paper also required a responsible attitude towards all existing inner structures.

Laws were passed: in 1971 the law regarding aid for city construction, and in 1973 the Bavarian law for the protection of historic sites. These greatly improved the legal basis for restoring the city and preserving historic sites. Historic buildings enjoy especially high levels of legally bound protection and maintenance. Since 1974, the highest priority in preserving historic sites has been given to the entity of individual buildings, and any maintenance or repair work must comply with the law.

General Goals

It's not just about preserving Regensburg's historic ensemble, grown over 2000 years. Residents and visitors ought to be able to experience buildings from earlier ages as an integral part of a living, functioning city. In 1977, the city council decided to pass a number of restoration policies:

a.	Our uppermost goal is to preserve the historic old town in its macrostructural and microstructural essence.
b.	We must preserve the land use structure of the old town.
c.	Existing residential use takes precedence and must not be displaced by other kinds of land use.
d.	The microstructure of individual owners must remain in existence.
e.	We must ensure the continued survival of shops and small businesses for services and trades.

Around half of all the buildings within the ensemble "Regensburg's old town with the island Stadtamhof" have been renovated already. Activities have focused mainly on the western part of the old town. Recently, areas of renovation have been defined in Stadtamhof and north of Ostengasse (the Donaumarkt area), so that we can expect future activities to centre on northern and eastern parts of the old town.

Individual tasks to preserve the city's overall image

As well as the restoration of the old town mentioned above, for decades the city has been developing concepts to preserve and improve the city's overall image. The following aspects are currently enjoying particular planning attention:

a.	Reorganising and redesigning public spaces
b.	Creating a connection between the old town and the main station
c.	Developing a "River City" concept for the area between the Iron Bridge and the old slaughterhouse
d.	Developing a thorough renovation plan for the 850 year old Stone Bridge
e.	Developing a city lighting concept to involve the old town
f.	Mandatory advice by a committee of experts for any facade renovations and any change of a building's colour
g.	An independent advisory board to examine all significant plans for alterations and new buildings in the ensemble area