By Danilo Gladow
In Weißensee, a new traffic concept is intended to bring less through traffic and more peace and quiet to the component district – the opposite is the case. Local residents are annoyed.
Well thought out, badly done: the neighborhood between Berliner Allee, Indira-Ghandi-Strasse and Gurtelstrasse has been a real car trap since Wednesday. You actually wanted to keep them away.
Until a few days ago, drivers were able to take a convenient and time-saving shortcut from Berliner Allee via the cozy district to Lichtenberg in the direction of Ostseestraße. Now they are confronted with a complicated network of opposing one-way streets.
The neighborhood promenades Bizetstrasse, Meyerbeerstrasse and Gounostrasse now run from Indira-Ghandi-Strasse and Gurtelstrasse as one-way streets to Smetanastrasse. And that, in turn, now runs as a one-way street to Berliner Allee.
In other words, it serves as the only valve to lead traffic back out of the component district – it’s just that it’s clearly too narrow for that. The result: a long, sluggish traffic jam that extends to every street in the district. In addition, Berliner Allee is currently single-lane at the level of Smetanastraße due to a BVG construction project. It can hardly absorb the flood of cars that rolls in from the component district.
Cyclists are also angry. Bizetstrasse, which was actually planned as a calmed bicycle lane in the new traffic concept, is now so crammed with cars that bicycles can hardly get through. The district actually says: “The traffic control measures are intended to prevent cars from crossing the neighborhood quickly and consistently.”
And the local residents? They can’t get anything out of the new situation either: “Chaos has reigned here for three days. I can’t open my windows anymore because of the exhaust fumes,” says resident Natalia Kempin.
Resident Natalia Kempin: “It was a bad idea to close Bizet Street because emergency vehicles can no longer get through to the hospital at the end of the street. Locking down the neighborhood is good, but how it’s done is wrong. In addition, drivers ignore all traffic signs” Photo: Sven Darmer
Politicians, meanwhile, are celebrating the concept that has been planned since 2020. Cornelius Bechtler, district councilor for urban development, explains: “I am very pleased that after the intensive preparation, in which all the planners involved worked hard to take the different requirements into account as optimally as possible, we are now able to present our neighborhood block concept for the composers’ quarter can now really get onto the streets in order to make the neighborhood more attractive and safer.”
What’s next for the Kiezblock? That will be revealed on June 9th. Then, at 1 p.m., the district invites residents to exchange initial experiences on Solonplatz.