Post card from Oldenburg

If you want to visit a well managed and sustainable city, Oldenburg should be on your list. It is 130 km to the east of Groningen NL (pop. 238k, 1,257 ppkm²), 40 km northwest of Bremen DE and is of a similar size to Hamilton (pop. 185k, 1,700 ppkm²). The city of Oldenburg DE (pop. 170k, 1,700 ppkm²) ‘is one of the most bicycle-friendly cities in Europe ... around 43 percent of the residents' journeys are made by bike; only in Houten (44%) is more cycling done ... Oldenburg is followed by Eindhoven and Groningen with 40%, Oss with 39% and Münster with 38%’ (from Oldenburg DE Wikipedia).

The measured mode share for bus use was in 2009 Oldenburg is 4.7%*, which is in between Hamilton’s 2018 census count of 2.8% work and 10.5% school. It would be interesting to see more detail on bus patronage, because I have been on full buses in Hamilton and on my visit to Oldenburg I had full buses pass as I waited at a bus stop. The third bus stopped to let some people off, providing just enough room for a few of us to squash in. It could be the number of bus services or more likely the road space/congestion caused by single occupant motor vehicles that is suppressing bus use in Oldenburg.

*Oldenburg 2009 Survey – which provides information on types of users

The city centre of Oldenburg is comfortably busy, with a mix of old and new, low- to mid-rise buildings, in irregular street layouts, giving it a pleasant ‘living room’ feel. I think the suburban malls and the outlying big box stores of Oldenburg provide a different type of service to the centre and that the city centre does not see them as competition, as can be seen in the 2030 plan for the city**, which hopes to use big-box-type suburban shopping centre with its 3,500 car parking in Wechloy for a park and ride (P+R). Here they plan to ‘shift inner-city car journeys to public transport’(p.57**) ... ‘[the Wechloy] retail centre has been developed with numerous parking spaces available ... [but] the successful implementation of a P+R system depends on the owners of the parking spaces ... The focus of the argument should be the economic advantage for local companies that arises when commuters use their vehicles to park at this location and, for example, go shopping after work’ (p.60**). The way I read this is that the city centre sees an advantage in having large suburban car parking lots at the edge of the city, to reduce car parking demand and reduce the number of cars on the inner ring road, allowing more buses and more people to move faster.

**Green-City-Plan Oldenburg. 

The Famila Einkaufsland Wechloy shopping center, 3,500 free car parks, Over 80 attractive specialist shops, many cozy cafés and restaurants under one roof.

In Oldenburg ‘a third of distances up to 1 km are taken on foot, distances of up to 5 km are preferably covered by bike. However, [for distances] over 5 km the car is the preferred means of transport’ (p.25*). For the future it is the Oldenburg bus network that has the most potential in reducing greenhouse gases. Here Oldenburg is trialling hydrogen-fuelled buses. Each bus costs about 610,000 euro (NZ$1,069,000). They have 33 seats, 39 standing spaces and two wheelchair spaces, take 10 minutes to refuel, and have a 400 kilometre range (Hydrogen bus link).

Oldenburg buses on inner ring road

Like most German city centres, public transport routes are designed to play a big part in bringing people to the centre. For Oldenburg most of the buses travel to the inner ring road that circles the city centre retail area. (Oldenburg bus maps)

One dwelling, one shop and one pub that can change use to three dwellings - Burgstrabe

The key to maintaining life in a city centre can be seen in Oldenburg in the above image, which shows a quiet corner street away from the main retail streets. What happens here is that when demand for commercial space declines, buildings can change to residential, bringing more local residents to the centre, and maintaining human activity in the centre. If you want to visit a well-managed and sustainable city, Oldenburg should be on your list.