The sports field full of dirt and slag, the tennis courts long since demolished, the archery range lowered further up. The three sports facilities in Swisttal-Odendorf in North Rhine-Westphalia, between Euskirchen and Rheinbach, have been completely destroyed. They lay right next to each other until mid-July – when the tide came.
The Orbach, which flows through the sports grounds, is usually a small trickle. At the moment it has even completely drained away. But on that fatal day in July, the Orbach was also transformed into a raging stream that carried away everything that stood in its way. In this case the sports area where three clubs had their home.
Siggi Blum from the Landessportbund NRW inspects the destroyed sports facilities. The 68-year-old is the helper in need, reactivated from retirement in order to support the affected sports clubs with his many years of expertise as a “manager” of popular sports. For him, even six months after the disaster, a picture of horror presents itself: “You can’t and are not allowed to build anything here. Because such a flood disaster can happen again and again at this point, so the sports clubs have to start from scratch elsewhere.”
At the end of October, the state sports association NRW A flood relief office was set up on the premises of the Erftstadt City Sports Associationto provide the clubs with professional support in this process. Because many of the voluntary associations are now faced with tasks that they have never had to face before. Again TuS Odendorf, whose sports field in the valley was a gem with its artificial turf. This now has to be built up elsewhere. “For this, the sports clubs have to deal with both basic planning issues and the requirements of the funding process for reconstruction. Support is good because not every volunteer knows about it in advance“says Blum.
New sports campus planned on Rübenacker
The community reacted quickly and bought a nearby arable land for the clubs. The new sports campus with a soccer field, tennis facility and archery range is to be built directly above the Orbach. Here Siggi Blum meets Klaus Jansen, the first chairman of the municipal sports association, and Karl-Heinz Müller, treasurer of the TuS Odendorf.
Numerous questions are still open in the planning. There are utility lines below the site, power cables run right next to the site, and further back is a nature reserve. All of that has to be included. The new sports campus is to be inaugurated in just three years. However, the ambitious schedule can only be adhered to if everything goes well. Five to seven years to completion are more realistic.
The new site is to be financed by the reconstruction fund. Of the 30 billion euros that the federal government is making available to repair the damage caused by the flood, 90 million euros are earmarked for sport. Here, too, many questions remain unanswered, including whether the money can also be used for interim solutions. So for sports facilities that are only used temporarily and are to be prepared again.
Like the destroyed sports field in Odendorf. That alone would cost a low six-figure sum. At least, because no one knows exactly how great the degree of destruction really is before the mud cover has been removed.
Without this interim solution, however, the existence of the Odendorfer sports clubs would be at stake, explains Klaus Jansen from the municipal sports association: “Because a club without a club house, without a central point of contact, that is a club without a soul.”
It is true that the athletes of the clubs are staying at or in other sports facilities for the time being. But it is something else to have the sports facility within walking distance or to have to organize driving to a more distant facility over the years. “Always having to play the home game away from home will not work in the long run. And that can mean the death of the clubs in the end.”Jansen believes.
New sports rooms existential for affected clubs.
the TuS Obendorf is not the only club that is facing this problem. Siggi Blum has with the TV Rheinbach 1905 eV another client in need of assistance. The largest multi-branch club in the city of 25,000 residents just before the border with Rhineland-Palatinate is also looking for sports facilities for its 1,500 members quickly and at short notice. The flood completely destroyed the old clubhouse.
For Thomas Schloßbauer, the chairman of the association, the existence of the TV Rheinbach declines that reasonable sports facilities are available to members again as soon as possible: “What the members want in a sports club is sport. We have to create adequate sports facilities again in a few months, otherwise the loyalty of even the most loyal member will end at some point.”
Membership fees are the decisive source of income for the clubs. The more members leave the association, the more difficult it becomes to secure its existence. In order to prevent the end of the association, creative solutions are required. That’s why the TV Rheinbach, with the support of Siggi Blum, identified a free area where there is already a certain sports infrastructure with sanitary facilities. Because a reconstruction in the same place as before is no longer possible here for reasons of flood protection.
The new area lies above the streams that destroyed the old clubhouse during the flood. A modern and light-flooded solution in container construction is to be created there in the coming months, explains Thomas Schloßbauer. That is also important to keep the people in the club. “I have to offer the members a modern and pleasant ambience, otherwise they’ll jump off us too“says the chairman of the association:”And we have to act farsighted, because this interim solution may also be a final solution in the end. “
The question remains as to which means this interim solution should be financed. The costs for this will be in the low six-digit range. In any case, the municipality is open to the container solution at this point. It is a first, important step for the association and also for the city of Rheinbach as a whole, in order to be able to guarantee a sporting, social and health-political provision of general interest.
96 clubs suffer total write-offs – reconstruction is in the balance
In North Rhine-Westphalia alone, 96 sports clubs suffered a total loss as a result of the flood disaster. This number was determined by the special representative of the LSB, Siggi Blum. If you add the light and medium damage to this, a total of 341 sports clubs are affected in North Rhine-Westphalia alone. “In Erftstadt alone, six sports clubs had to experience a complete destruction of their facilities”, reports Blum.
Most of these sports facilities can be rebuilt at their old location. In order to receive money from the reconstruction fund, the clubs must submit a corresponding application. And for this, the city or municipality must certify that the construction at the previous location is also desired.
But many clubs have not yet received such a certificate, says the chairman of the Erftstadt City Sports Association, Peter Kaulen-Windgassen: “We hope that the clubs concerned will have planning security by spring at the latest.” Because everything else would be for the existence of the clubs “a bad thing”.
Sports clubs are suffering from the aftermath of the summer flood disaster. It will be a long road to return to the pre-flood status quo. Many sports clubs will only be able to make it through with considerable effort, appropriate technical support and, above all, immense financial resources.
Status: December 31, 2021, 11:18 am