A comment on the Rostockean approach –
Rostock’s history and prosperity are closely connected with shipping and the city harbour. The city harbour and adjacent areas will regain a stronger influence on both, the cityscape and life in Rostock, in the future. There has been an informal consensus after 1991 to open up the city harbour and the banks of the Warnow River banks for the people of Rostock and their guests in a modern way.
Rostock has been reopening to its river, the Warnow, from all directions and with a balanced and sustainable mix of functions after 1991. The time to separate the city centre and the public awareness of the city’s inhabitants spatially and functionally from the city harbour had been over since 1991. In the meantime, Rostock has been consolidated. The latest challenge is to expand the “heart of the city”, to develop an inviting space for port business, tourism, urban commerce, living and leisure; the BUGA2025 is the current milestone in this respect. In the 1990s, the easiest way would have been to radically clean up the area with exclusive and spectacular real estate projects from private hands and turn the area into a place “exclusive and chic for everyone” for a solvent clientele. Instead, it has been consensus from the beginning that common interest should overrule individual interests even in this extremely potential-rich city harbour and the banks of the Unter-warnow, which could have been a promise of “fast money”, and that the development should be implemented cautiously and strategically.
Photo credits: all photos Hanseatic and University City Rostock, exceptional photo 3, courtesy of: https://grandcirclecorporation.zenfolio.com/mv-clio_ship/heac156c3#heac156c3