Bavaria
Residents have to live with church bells
According to a Bavarian court, the ringing of church bells is acceptable for residents. photo
© Daniel Karmann/dpa
If you live near a church, you have to accept that the bells ring there several times a day. But this is a real torture for a man in Bavaria.
The ringing of the church bells is heard Bavaria is like Oktoberfest: For a resident of a market town in the Kelheim district who lives near a Catholic parish church, the quarter-hourly chiming time between 6 a.m. and 10 p.m. is much too loud – he complained about it.
However, without success, because the Regensburg regional court dismissed the injunction in the first instance. The man appealed against this decision and has now failed before the Nuremberg Higher Regional Court, as a spokeswoman announced on Tuesday.
The man complained that the ringing of the bell was causing him health problems. On the other hand, the court decided that the sounds of the time chiming did not exceed the limit of reasonableness.
An expert measured the noise and found that the bell ringing in question complied with the guidelines set out in an administrative regulation. The plaintiff also knew that there had been a parish church near his home for around 125 years. The OLG decision in the civil proceedings of February 15th is legally binding.
The man had already failed before the Regensburg Administrative Court in 2022 when he sued against the ringing of bells for prayer and church services.