Groningen is dancing to the tune of the events industry because of its ambition, says Saskia Sterkman. She discovered that even before Rammstein, sound standards were being stretched to suit concert organizers.
“He who pays, decides” is an old saying, but it is far from outdated. This recently appeared to apply in Groningen, when the municipality increased the noise standards for Rammstein.
If it were up to the council, such an increase in noise standards would become part of policy for the City Park. In the Future Vision for Events, which will be examined by the council on Wednesday, September 13, she wrote that “in exceptional cases it may be desirable to slightly increase the noise standards for a short period.”
A sentence full of vagueness, which together create so much policy space that almost everything becomes legitimate. It remains undefined how often and on what basis an exception may be made; who determines whether and why an exception is desired; how long a short period lasts; and what exactly is meant by ‘something’ in relation to raising noise standards, knowing that +3dB may sound like ‘something’, but it means no less than a doubling of the noise load.
Other priorities than safeguarding quality of life
The answer to the question of who decides whether an exception is desirable is easy to guess: it is the concert and festival organizers, who have very different priorities than monitoring the quality of life around the locations they visit during their tours.
Groningen has put itself in a vulnerable position by shouting from the rooftops that it wants to turn the Stadspark into a top events location, comparable to Nijmegen’s Goffert Park. After all, she is dependent on the events industry to achieve that goal: if it does not come, her plan will fall apart. Rammstein saw and used that vulnerability to get what he wanted.
That band wasn’t the first, I discovered.
Municipality granted modified permits
In June 2022, concert organizer Mojo brought three events to the Stadspark within one week. Mojo had announced in advance that it was unable (or unwilling) to meet the noise standards. The municipality therefore granted amended permits, from which the usual statement ‘noise standards at the stage’ was omitted.
That week, not the municipality, but Mojo determined how many decibels bounced off the facades around the Drafbaan. That was 3 more than if the municipal standard had been used, so: twice as much noise and nuisance experiences in a larger radius around the City Park.
Meanwhile, the councilor said she was “doing everything she can to keep disruption to a minimum.”
Groningen has proven to be ‘decibel-able to blackmail’
Groningen, because of its ambition, has danced to the tune of the events industry. She has proven to be ‘decibel-able to blackmail’. And now she proposes to convert that behavior into policy and thus normalize it: the next step on a slippery slope.
Loss of control is lurking, in fact it will already be a fact in 2022. Then Mojo refused City Supervision officials access to the Trotbaan to take noise measurements in the context of the monitoring that week, which had been promised by the council to the council and local residents. And Mojo only wanted to share his own measurements after the last event.
A typical case of ‘finger given, hand lost’.
Insight into the future
It gives a glimpse into the future. Because if the council agrees to what the council has proposed, the municipality will soon be out of control, will no longer be able to hold the helm and will be at the mercy of the whims of the private party of that moment.
Delivered, because setting conditions to protect one’s own interests is generally not one of the tools of the underlying party. And both Rammstein and Mojo have shown that the municipality is under.
A sad image. Even sadder when you consider that the municipality now seems to have forgotten the battle for lowering noise standards in the City Park, which local residents waged and won because of the nuisance from 2013-2016. Apparently the turnover rate in politics is so great that, after 7 years, as a local resident you may be forced to repeat your own history.
If nothing else, we will. Because we do intend to fight for our well-being.
Saskia Sterkman, a local resident, based her findings on documents that the municipality received from her 4 months after receipt Woo request published. Legally this is 4 weeks (plus 2 weeks extension).