Aircraft noise reducing property prices by up to 30% near Frankfurt airport

Residents in Frankfurt, whose homes are now  blighted by noise from the new 4th runway, that produces much more aircraft noise than expected, now know their property values are being seriously reduced.  A recent study found the decline is up to 30%, in 20 communities around the airport. Those who can afford to are moving out of the area. The cost of compensating all those affected would be enormous, and so they are saying that the noise has to be reduced substantially.


 

DEPRECIATION: Aircraft noise lowers real estate prices

Fluglärm senkt Immobilienpreise

From JUTTA RIPPEGATHER

14.6.2012

Luxurious living on the mountain lark – that was then. Photo: DAPD
[Very badly translated article from the German – apologies for the the translation quality !]

Because of aircraft noise properties lose their value in the Frankfurt south – up to 30%, concludes a study commissioned by the Left Group in order. The way the compensation is too expensive. It should be working on the sound insulation.

Prior to the opening of the runway in October, the house with a garden lark at Frankfurt mountain was worth 1.3 million euros. Now it is sold. To an investor from Dubai – for less than one million, says estate agent Lydia Ishikawa, who lives in the neighborhood. “The bargain hunters are on the road.”

Even in less polluted corners of the south of Frankfurt, a fall in prices was observed. Instead of the desired 3,500 euros per square meter, the owner of a nice penthouse apartment had reached only 3,000 €.

The Frankfurt airport has lost in May, another freight business. In the month of Germany’s largest hub were 168 000 tonnes of air freight – a 10.6 percent less than a year before – loaded as the operating company Fraport reported on Thursday.

When the passengers saw a slight increase of Frankfurt 1.4 percent to 5.1 million passengers. This was in May 2012, the strongest of all time. The comparatively small increase in passengers despite broadened runway capacity Fraport led back to the many holidays in May.

At the Group’s airports with Fraport’s majority-owned passenger numbers rose by 0.4 percent to just under nine million. The freight and mail volume fell by 8.5 percent throughout the group to just under 195,000 tonnes. Declining freight volumes are announcing an economic downturn.

A development that is observed in the whole Rhine-Main area: The aircraft noise leads to a loss in property value of up to 30 percent. This is the conclusion of a study that created the Darmstadt Rhein-Main-Institut and the Technical University of Chemnitz on behalf of the Left Group in the Hesse state parliament. The team led by Friedrich Thiessen has to brokers interviewed 30 in 20 communities around the Frankfurt airport.

Regional fund falls short

Researchers looked  at four smaller areas with a total area of ​​80 hectares in Offenbach, Mülheim, and came to the conclusion that planned by the State Government regional funding falls short: 8.4 million euros per year would be only the people living there entitled to as compensation as Thiessen. “This highlights the enormous costs, which causes the noise and the huge social injustices, which manages the air traffic.” The way of compensation was too expensive. “It must therefore be gone very heavily in the direction of active noise control.”

How this might look like, Dirk spent grain from the interest group says the fight against aircraft noise: a ban on night flights 22-6 clock and a noise limit of 40 decibels on the day the World Health Organization calls for five years.

Less noise alone brings relief, and Younes Erhardt says the club house & basic Hesse. If not, would in the Rhine-Main area in many places reduced the value of the property, “and stay out.” And not only that

Those who can afford to move away. Thus could the  disturb the social equilibrium of the area, the home Nassau warns in its opinion, the Regional Fund bill. Then not only property owners would have a problem, but also politics.

 

Original article in German at

http://www.fr-online.de/flughafen-frankfurt/wertverlust-fluglaerm-senkt-immobilienpreise,2641734,16385362.html

 

A local resident in Frankfurt, affected by the aircraft noise and the reduction in property values writes:

“We are now seeing more and more articles about the loss in house values of 30% and
more for the Southern part of Frankfurt. These are real losses, as they refer to people leaving the area because of the abusive noise. This reduction in price is significant as house prices are going up steeply by more than 20% per  year in
formerly comparable areas in other parts of the city.  The areas of Niederrad,
Lerchesberg, Sachsenhausen were between the highest valued living areas of
Frankfurt until October 2011.  Not any more!   That is thanks FRAPORT and Lufthansa.

“It is also interesting  that the comments in the papers are not only referring to the loss for
the concerned owners but refers also to the negative social changes for the city as people seek to move away.  It is obvious that the population will change, and  this will become socially a burden for the city.

“If you consider that Frankfurt is one of the 3 final candidates for the “Green European City Award 2012″ you can but worry what on earth must  the other candidates be like?”

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More news and information about Frankfurt airport and protests against the runway at Frankfurt Airport

 

 


 

Blog by John Stewart on what is happening with protests against German airport expansion at  

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