“ZwischenZeit” at Büchel

What is actually going on at Büchel? Where you could watch the concrete parking garage from the ‘60s being “chipped away” at Büchel from April 2021 to mid-2022, a lot of space has now been created and prepared for new projects. For “ZwischenZeit am Büchel”, proprietor of the area Städtische Entwicklungsgesellschaft Aachen GmbH&Co.KG (SEGA), has had the quarter redesigned in an attractive and multifunctional way.  

Whether you want to sit out in the sun with a book, meet friends, attend events, or have something to offer others. ZwischenZeit am Büchel – ZZAB for short and loosely translated as “interim period at Büchel”– invites Aachen's urban community to get involved with the site of the former parking garage. To ensure that this plan is successful, a curator has been commissioned to provide advice and guidance until the final redevelopment of the new old town quarter in 2025, which will see a public green and open space as its center.

Potential Through Pioneering and Interim Projects and Events

The strategy that the city of Aachen and SEGA are pursuing is multi-faceted: making change visible, creating space for opportunities and urban laboratories, combining innovative and creative potential through pioneering and interim projects and events, as well as through the exploratory process “Making a City at Büchel”.

Thus, the parking garage was also approved as a place for meeting and creativity – despite the pandemic – from its closure in summer 2020 until the start of the demolition work. At the Parking ART event, the whole parking garage was used as a graffiti area with culture and music for two days. This continued in two former brothels on Antoniusstrasse in late 2020/early 2023, where they served as pop-up stores selling artwork for a few weeks.

In two SEGA buildings at Mefferdatisstraße 14-18, four commercial units of approx. 300 square meters were converted into the Mefferdatisstraße Transformation Center. This is a meeting and creative environment – a sustainability café, theater stage, maker and coworking space – that was transformed with input from the citizens and then rented to the association “hi, wir sind die meffi.s e.V.”. After three stores and a pub gradually came into use in the summer of 2022, the spaces now act as a new meeting point, bringing light and diverse young life to the street.

A Complex Project in the Heart of Aachen’s Old Town

How did the new stage of the development at Büchel come about? The Büchel quarter sees the development of a new area in the city center which needs to take into account a wide range of aspects such asthe UNESCO World Heritage Site of Aachen Cathedral, adjacent buildings and underground ruins under monument protection, thermal water, prostitution, a vacant department store – the former HORTEN – and other large constructions, such as Aachen Bus Station. Specifically: After several failed attempts by private investors, the City itself took the helm of the project in 2019,buying up the area and calling on the urban community to contribute its own concepts and ideas in the exploratory process “Making a City at Büchel”. Following the political decision to focus on “WIESE” (lawn) at Büchel in 2021, an urban development concept is now in place – one that sees a green and open space in the center that is surrounded by new buildings. All building plots owned by SEGA are allocated via so-called concept processes. This means that not the company with the highest bid, rather the one with the best idea for the site will be selected as the future developer.

 

The Approach – Aachen’s Urban Community as an Equal Partner

How can we successfully develop a lively new part of the old town, with the support of the public? What strength does the redevelopment of an inner-city site need to develop in order to initiate a turnaround for the surrounding area? How can we create a sustainable and resilient urban building block incorporating the mobility of the future?

Instead of seeking a conventional sole stakeholder from the real estate industry as a partner once again, the site is now being developed together with a large number of investors from the urban community. The open exploratory process “Making a City at Büchel”, which addresses the entire urban community, ties the city makers to the project, i.e. stakeholders who are willing to invest or use the city. To date, many have expressed their interest – not only "large” players, but also joint building ventures and associations focused on social inclusion, larger and smaller traders, and non-profit stakeholders. A robust web of urban uses is thus developing.

Transparency, broad participatory methods, and opportunities are important for the Büchel project. Whether as idea generators, city makers, contributors to the “ZwischenZeit” period, or as contributors in video, virtual, or in-person formats, or simply at the big “ZwischenFest” – everyone is equally respected as an expert in urban development. In 2023, SEGA will also invite the public to a wide variety of formats. The project can only succeed by collaborating with many existing partners in the urban community! This also includes various departments at RWTH and FH Aachen University of Applied Sciences. For example, at the RWTH Cultural Geography Teaching and Research Unit, a student will document life at ZwischenZeit in their master's thesis. And the area keeps attracting RWTH students of urban planning, architecture, or landscape planning writing their theses on the Büchel quarter or carrying out student semester projects there.

Milestones of the Development to Date

• 2019: The city buys back the parking garage site and some other properties at Büchel from the then investors and establishes Städtische Entwicklungsgesellschaft Aachen GmbH & Co. KG.
• 2020: Still under the leadership of City administration, guiding principles, methods, and strategies were developed. Launch of the “Making a City at Büchel” appeal, workshops, SEGA starts under new management at Büchel at Mefferdatisstraße.
• 2021: Cooperative planning workshop on: Knowledge, housing, lawns; decisions on the principal use of the “lawn” concept and commissioning of the development of the urban master plan; start of the demolition of the parking garage.
• 2022: Debate on urban development variants for the “lawn” at Büchel, commissioning of various specialist agencies, including for the specification of “special topics” such as mobility, climate, and water. Start of the application process for the KNOWLEDGE  building block in the concept process. Completion of the plot for ZwischenZeit at Büchel.
• 2023: Start of ZwischenZeit am Büchel, landscape planning competition, city plan process, identification of leaseholder, building block knowledge, start of consultations with city makers, and concept process for another building block.
• 2024: City planning comes into effect, landscape planning extended, finding partners for further plots via the concept process, underground engineering planning.
• 2025: Start of the underground engineering, park area, and first structural engineering measures.

– Author: Antje Eickhoff