Regensburg celebrates its freedom
The Elector’s Chamber at the Old Town Hall formed the backdrop at 7:30 p.m. on November 20. There, the European City Charter was handed along to representatives of the European Capital of Culture – RUHR.2010.
Shortly prior to festivities celebrating the granting of the city’s own charter in 1245, Mayor Hans Schaidinger presented the European City Charter – augmented with the Regensburg Codicil – to Professor Hanns-Dietrich Schmidt and Ms. Susanne Skipiol. These are the representatives of RUHR.2010, the European Capital of Culture, who are responsible for international relations.
“Former rivals have become partners,” said Prof. Schmidt. More important than winning the coveted title are good relationships and netwerking among former applicants and RUHR.2010.
The City Charter, moving in a sort of relay race from town to town, has been augmented with “codicils” appended by eleven former competitors for the Capital of Culture 2010. An amended City Charter is thus created at each stop.
The European City Charter, which started in Essen, will now be moving from Regensburg to the City of Bremen and will reach the end of its journey when it returns to Karlsruhe. That southern German town was the source of the idea for the inter-city event, intended to network the towns involved.
The purpose of the project, evolving in the framework of RUHR.2010, is to define what the city of the future is to look like.
The European cities and their residents are to be included in efforts to shape a European urban identity in the form of a text that they draft, outlining how the cities' future will be like.
With the contribution by the city of Regensburg – “Europe in transition – From cultural comparisons to cultural contacts and cultural exchanges” – Mayor Hans Schaidinger hopes to put the integration of other cultures in the spotlight. In line with this, foreign students at the University in Regensburg will participate in formulating the cultural development plan.
“Ideas put forward by the residents of Regensburg – both those born here and those with an immigrant background – are to meld and merge to shape a new common culture,” says Schaidinger.
Tomorrow’s city would be inconceivable without a lively exchange among cultures. In Regensburg the heritages imported by immigrants have traditionally been a component in the local culture and will be so to an even greater extent in the future.