Should parking spaces be eliminated for more greenery or better cycle paths? Munich is divided on this issue. A survey conducted by RIM Marktforschung GmbH on behalf of the state capital’s press and information office shows how sharp the front line is. Their result: approval and rejection are balanced at 45.6 and 47.6 percent respectively.
442 Munich residents who were representatively selected were surveyed. The fluctuation range of the results for this selection is five percent. The exact question, which was asked in writing between the end of September and the end of October, was: “Are you in favor of parking spaces in your living area to improve the quality of stay (for example more greenery, play areas and seats, more space for pedestrians) or Improved cycling infrastructure is no longer necessary?”
Only 6.8 percent of those surveyed said they had no opinion on this. According to the initiators, what is striking about the results is the unusually high proportion of strong agreement (“Absolutely” 22.5 percent) and rejection (“Absolutely not” 25 percent).
Approval was particularly high at 70.7 percent (no 24.7 percent) among supporters of the Greens, followed by those of the SPD (yes 48.2 percent and no 39.1 percent), whereas CSU voters or sympathizers overwhelmingly negative (yes 27.9 percent/no 66.5 percent).
The connection between the results and the age of the respondents is also striking. While agreement predominates in the age groups under 35 years (yes 58 percent/no 39 percent) and between 35 and 49 years (yes 56 percent/no 39.8 percent), it dominates in the age groups between 50 and 64 years (yes 34, 7 percent/no 62.3 percent) and those older than 65 years (yes 25.9 percent/no 53.3 percent) were rejected.
Of the 400 or so respondents, around two thirds said they used a parking space near their home. Of these, the owners of a garage or a private parking space rejected the reallocation of parking spaces (58.1 and 55.8 percent respectively), the users of parking spaces on public property were undecided (yes 50.2 percent/no 48.5 percent). . As expected, people who do not use a parking space themselves were clearly in favor of conversions to create more greenery (62 percent were in favor, around 30.4 percent were against).
The missing values to reach 100 percent are explained by those who did not provide any information.