16.10.2013 - Ausgabe: 5/2013

A modern city of sport – sports, exercise and play in Cologne

Cologne is a city that has a history reaching back 2000 years and a unique, in-imitable personality infused with a diversity and vitality manifested in many different ways in local business, culture and tourism and generally across a broad spectrum of its public life.
When it comes to sports and exercise, this metropolis on the Rhine benefits from in-novative sports-related projects and an extensive, high-quality sports amenity infra-structure, while it also stages major sports competitions from the leisure sport to world championship levels, is home to several successful sports teams and many internationally prominent athletes and regularly plays host to first-class sporting events.
Cologne is exceptionally hospitable with regard to sports. Many of its residents are enthusiastically involved in sports on a part-time basis, either as active participants or as (usually) voluntary club officials. The 800 registered sports clubs in Cologne can boast of a total membership of 200,000 – a significant proportion of the city’s population thus keeps fit through sports.

But all this sport, exercise and play would be impossible without the sports facilities provided by the city authorities. Within the metropolitan area are some 2,000,000 m2 outdoor and 25,000 m2 indoor sports amenities, not counting the commercially operated facilities. Cologne has 88 cinderbased, 23 artificial grasssurfaced and 43 large scale grass sports fields. There are 43 athletics tracks, an equivalent number of tennis courts and nine beach volleyball fields supplemented by numerous smaller games fields catering for basketball, volleyball, football and handball. The city inventory comprises 660 facilities that are designated as playgrounds or sports fields. Then there are the many water sports amenities. The football fields alone are used by 900 teams and amateurs for more than 170,000 training and playing hours annually.
The showcase project that best illustrates Cologne’s sportsorientated attitude is the Sportpark Müngersdorf, which is located in the city’s peripheral green belt. It is one of the mainstays of Cologne’s endeavours in the realms of sport and it also houses a range of national and internationally important sports institutions and facilities. This includes, for example, the German Sport University, the Olympic Centre Rhineland (OSP Rheinland) and the RheinEnergieStadion football stadium, the home ground of 1. FC Köln, the city’s most prominent soccer team. The historic and monumental arcaded ‘Abelbauten’ designed by architect Adolf Abel in the 1920s that still flank the northern entrance to the stadium are where the offices of Cologne’s Department of Sport can be found. It is from here that the city’s sporting activities are supervised and the maintenance required for the upkeep of the sport facility infrastructure in the Sportpark and nearly all sports grounds in Cologne is coordinated. The Department of Sport is responsible for more than 250,000 m2 outdoor and 1500 m2 indoor sports amenities located in the Sportpark Müngersdorf alone; these include 13 natural grass, four synthetic grass and two cinder-based sports fields and six sports
and gymnastics halls.
The core of the Sportpark consists to the north of the equestrian and baseball stadiums
and the stadium green, to the west is the western arena and the German Sport University Cologne together with the NetCologne stadium and the Albert Richter velodrome, to the east is the eastern arena, the ground of the rugby club ASV Köln and the tennis and hockey club stadium KTHC Rot-Weiss Cologne with the stadium swimming pool while to the south can be found the Jahnwiese playing fields.It was formerly the case that the sport clubs and the traditional sports facilities were at the focus of the various activities. However, leisure behaviour has changed over the intermediate
years. People now have less free time while demographic changes mean that many prefer to take exercise as individuals. Today, many go walking, jogging, train in the fitness gym or simply complete their exercise programme at home. The question thus arises of what today’s athletes, amateur and professional, need now and will require in future. Local authorities need to consider how to use the resources available to them in order to meet these requirements. It is these considerations that form
the basis for the policies being adopted in Cologne.
Jürgen Roters, Mayor of Cologne, comments: “Our main priorities are our residents and their health. We are aware of many of the wishes and needs of those actively involved in sporting activities because we are in constant dialogue with them and with institutions. This means that we have current trends firmly in view. We strive to find solutions for each individual target group but are,
of course, forced to perform a careful juggling act when it comes to providing them with what they
want because of the problematic financial situation.”

As a result of demographic transition, senior citizens have, for example, become a particularly important target group. The local authority thus ensures that it is represented in the various senior citizen sports bodies. Among other things, the agenda of the city authorities thus involves
work on a regular basis with the senior citizen’s sports society Arbeitskreis Sport für Ältere in collaboration with the umbrella organisation of sports associations in Cologne, the StadtSportBund. It also provides support in a wide range of different forms to projects designed to promote
sports among the elderly. A multigenerational playground in the Longerich district and a generational encounter area in Volkoven-Weiler have been created in Cologne as focal meeting points for senior citizens who want to take exercise outside organised groups. There are other specific options for the elderly looking for central facilities in which freely accessible exercise equipment is available in the numerous parks and recreational areas of Cologne in Nippes (Blücherpark) in the inner green
belt and the urban woodlands in the Dürener Strasse and in Geißbockheim. The facilities here are popular and are extensively used.

The family-friendly nature of a city is another factor that significantly determines its future
viability. Of particular relevance here playgrounds and playing fields and other exercise amenities. Cologne as a city is growing. One of its primary objectives is thus to find the correct balance
between residential housing and urban free space. For decades now, the city has employed a policy of actively involving the actual users at as early a phase as possible in the planning of new facilities and the process of refurbishing existing play areas and playing fields. “Participation is of central importance to us. It is only through the participation of the stakeholders themselves that we can ensure that children and young people actually appreciate the playgrounds and fields created for them and use them for exercise and play,” explains Mayor Jürgen Roters.
In recent years, using the resources provided through the Federal Government’s second economic stimulus package and other subsidy programmes, Cologne has managed to get several related projects up and running. In the Rheinauhafen regeneration area on the banks of the Rhine it has built the Kap686 skateboard park and the sheltered ‘Familienpark’ family recreation area under the Zoobrücke bridge that offers a variety of sport, play and leisure activities. In addition to undertaking
these major showcase projects, Cologne is also dedicating its energies to renovating ageing play areas and making these more attractive. Cologne’s city council has commissioned a comprehensive ‘Playground requirement plan’ that will serve as the working basis for coming years. The main accent is being placed on playground safety but the contributions being made by the nearly 400 playground sponsors, supporters and donors from among Cologne’s residents are seen as similarly vital. Over the past two years alone, some 70 playgrounds and playing fields have been modified, extended or overhauled. The work undertaken extends from the replacement of individual pieces of equipment to the complete reconstruction of a facility. In many cases, it was only thanks to the voluntary contributions made by local residents that these projects could be realised. Urban free space is an essential constituent and the very backbone of any community that has ambitions to be considered
familyfriendly. To make sure that Cologne remains a desirable potential place to live for incomers and their families, it needs to be able to provide more than just secure employment options and neighbourhood child care facilities. Existing play areas must be maintained, but ongoing trends must also be taken into account. Not so long ago, the skateboarders in the ‘Domplatte’, the pedestrianised zone around Cologne’s cathedral, represented a constant annoyance to tourists and resident businesses alike. The young people concerned have since turned their attentions to the skateboard park and Familienpark, where they can perform ollies and flip tricks to their hearts’ content. Skateboarders can be found practicing there even when the weather is poor – the planners could not possibly wish for a better endorsement of their concept. Playgrounds need to be renovated if they are not to lose their appeal and the necessary work can simply take the form of preventative measures.

Mayor Roters is by and large proud of what his city can offer in terms of sport, play and exercise amenities: “I think here in Cologne we can justifiably call ourselves a ‘city of sport’ in the best sense of the phrase. Sports are not only catered for at the top end, at the professional and club levels. At the individual levels, our young and older citizens keep themselves fit thanks to their enjoyment of exercise and sports.” Photos: Stadt Köln