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GERMAN BRIEF: ENVIRONMENT

Green spaces dominate

Germany’s largest cities

Research by German Brief *


German Brief: Germany's greenest cities

Almost 70 per cent of the land areas of Germany’s largest cities are devoted to parks, woodlands, fields and private gardens. With green spaces making up 86 per cent of its urban area, Siegen, in North-Rhine Westphalia, is the ‘greenest’ German city. Ludwigshafen, home to BASF, the world’s largest chemical company, is the least green of Germany’s 79 Großstädte, cities with more than 100,000 inhabitants. There are 17 cities where green spaces make up 80 per cent or more of their land areas. The list of 17 includes university cities like Aachen, Freiburg, Saarbrücken and Münster. The German capital Berlin is placed 63rd in the overall table, while Hamburg, Munich and Cologne are ranked 39th, 74th and 65th respectively.


With an aera of 3.7 square kilometres, Munich’s Englischer Garten is Germany’s largest city park. Berlin’s Tiergarten, Europe’s largest wildlife park, ranks second.


The land area of all of Germany’s largest 79 cities totals, cities with more than 100,000 residents, 13,564 square kilometres, equivalent to the size of Montenegro, while their green spaces amount to 9,457 sq km, an area roughly the size of Cyprus. Green spaces include parks, woodland and agricultural land within city borders and also private gardens.


Germany's top 20 of greenest cites

City

(population)

Total area

in sq km

Green spaces

in sq km

Green spaces

(% of total area)

Siegen

103,000

115

99

86%

Göttingen

117,000

117

99

85%

Bergisch Gladbach

112,000

83

70

84%

Salzgitter

104,000

224

186

84%

Pforzheim

126,000

98

82

83%

Aachen

249,000

161

133

82%

Hildesheim

102,000

93

76

82%

Freiburg

231,000

153

125

82%

Hagen

189,000

160

130

81%

Saarbrücken

179,000

167

136

81%

Bielefeld

333,000

258

209

81%

Münster

316,000

303

245

81%

Paderborn

152,000

179

143

80%

Hamm

179,000

226

181

80%

Jena

111,000

114

91

80%

Remscheid

111,000

75

60

80%

Trier

112,000

117

92

79%

Wolfsburg

124,000

204

161

79%

Rostock

209,000

181

143

79%

TOTAL / GERMAN

AVERAGE (based on 79 cities)

13,564

9,457

69%


German cities with below average of green spaces

City (population)

Total area in sq km

Green spaces in sq km

Green spaces (% of total area)

Erfurt

214,000

269

143

53%

Regensburg

152,000

81

43

53%

Fürth

128,000

63

33

52%

Munich

1,488,000

310

155

50%

Halle

238,000

135

66

49%

Nürnberg

515,000

186

89

48%

Mannheim

310,000

145

64

44%

Leipzig|

597,000

297

126

42%

Ludwigshafen

173,000

78

27

35%

TOTAL / GERMAN AVERAGE (based on 79 cities)

13,564

9,457

69%

* Sources and research methodology:

(1) The research used the size of urban areas provided by municipal websites as well as relevant Wikipedia pages.

(2) The green spaces research was carried out the Berliner Morgenpost using 185 satellite images.

(3) The population figures date from 2020.


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