Fritz Stauner has lived in the Graßlfinger Moos, a huge nature reserve that belongs to Olching, for decades. “Building in the moss” is a topic that has also affected everyone involved for many years, but has not yet been satisfactorily resolved. Stauner has lived on Birkenhofstrasse since 1973 – right next to the fire station there, which is currently being renovated. The native of Straubing, who initially lived in Gröbenzell and came to the “Moos” in 1964, used to run a riding stable. The 83-year-old is now standing in front of his property entrance and is walking along the gabion wall that he erected as a fence in 2016. The Fürstenfeldbruck district office has now obtained a court order that a company commissioned by them can soon tear down this gabion wall. According to the district office, this will cost the owner around 46,000 euros. Stauner defends himself because the competent district office as the building authority puts him at a disadvantage: “Others are allowed to build, I have to demolish.”
The owner has laid stones in front of the property, making the roadway narrower.
(Photo: Günther Reger)
The term gabion is borrowed from Italian. “Gabbione” means big cage. In the Middle Ages, the baskets, which were then woven from willow, served as a military bulwark. After the wire baskets filled with stones were mainly used in the construction of infrastructure, such as road construction, they found their way into domestic gardens via gardeners and landscapers.
Stauner’s stone wall acts as a fence around the entire large property, part of which he sold three years ago. The fence is 75 meters long, 1.70 meters high and 25 centimeters deep. There are also gabions at three entrances to the property. For the owner, the building serves as protection against noise and dust. The traffic on the narrow street is surprisingly brisk, across the street is a scaffolding company. The district office had already rejected the building permit for the gabion fence in a nature reserve in 2016 and then asked the owner to demolish it in several decisions, including court decisions in his favor. Stauner was stubborn and has repeatedly taken legal action against it. He shows a photo that the construction inspector of the district office took in 2016 with him on the foundation of what later became the gabion wall. “The inspector didn’t tell me at the time that the gabion wall wouldn’t be approved,” says Stauner, “then I certainly wouldn’t have built it.”
Stauner is an old acquaintance at the building authority in the district office. His buildings often deviated from the planning application. “He repeatedly erected buildings or building extensions that were not approved,” says Sabine Dösing, the legal head of the building, housing and environmental protection department in the district office. Stauner then often won a settlement through court proceedings and the controversial sheepfold was allowed to stand. For Sabine Dösing, the legal situation regarding gabion walls is clear. Stauner have no privilege in the outdoor area, this includes the moss to build. His property is also in a conservation area. “For this he needs a nature conservation permit, which does not exist for the gabion wall,” says Dösing.
Trending for a few years
It can be observed everywhere that gabion walls as fences have been in vogue for a number of years. Even the gardens of terraced houses are bordered with it, for example on the corner of Kreuzlinger Strasse and Wiesenstrasse in Germering. Environmentalists strictly reject the stone fences because, for example, they offer no habitat for insects and further accelerate insect mortality. This does not justify the decision of the district office. It’s more for aesthetic reasons. The gabion wall “is alien to the character of the moorland and the agricultural landscape” and “has a negative effect on the character of the area,” the office wrote to Stauner in April 2017.
The Birkenhofstrasse in the Graßlfing district of Olching.
(Photo: Carmen Voxbrunner)
Now Fritz Stauner’s large property is on a corner of Birkenhofstrasse, where nobody lives except him and his new neighbor. Opposite next to the scaffolding company there is another large meadow, guarded loudly by two dogs. Birkenhofstraße is a narrow street there. Along the Stauner estate it is even narrower because he has placed several stones about half a meter high there. This measure by Stauner goes back to an old conflict. The gravel road was once paved by the municipality without consulting it, the owner of the 80-centimetre-wide strip of the road, he says. In such cases, it is quite common for municipalities to buy a narrow strip from the owner before undertaking road construction work. Stauner cites reference cases to show that he is wronged and others are not. However, they did not stand up in court. Not even the reference to the four-metre-high gabion wall on the nearby motorway or to a letter from District Administrator Thomas Karmasin to a recipient in Maisach from 2017. In it Karmasin writes: “Unauthorized construction projects outside are not protected and must be removed as a matter of principle . However, removal can be disproportionate in individual cases, so that toleration must be considered.” Stauner knows that his legal remedies will soon be exhausted and is willing to compromise given the demolition costs he faces. “I would remove the stones from the wire mesh,” he confirms in an interview with the SZ, “leave the wire wall and plant plants on the fence.” His lawyer wrote a letter to this effect to the district office, but has not yet received an answer.
The district office apparently no longer wants to accept a compromise. “Rather no,” says Sabine Dösing, the former judge at the Augsburg Administrative Court. “It dragged on for years, now we have to do it too.” The city of Olching also sees “no more room for a comparison” after the court decision, as the head of the building department, Markus Brunnhuber, confirms, who also confirms the city’s opinion: “A gabion wall outdoors is alien to the nature of things.” According to the district office, the demolition – including the concrete foundation – will take place as soon as the right company has been found. Stauner could still play a trump card. It looks like the district office forgot to include one of four floor numbers that belong to its property in the demolition order, so it is possible that the entire gabion wall cannot be demolished.