Noise terror on the B104: Residents are finally demanding real solutions!

Noise terror on the B104: Residents are finally demanding real solutions!

The Bruchmanns live in Sternberg, a family that lives on the B104 and has suffered from the unbearable street noise for years. Life at the Mecklenburgring becomes torture, especially from 5 a.m. onwards. The peace and quiet that many long for seems a long way off. Reinhard Bruchmann reports that log trucks are particularly loud, especially when they drive over manhole covers. A problem that comes up again and again in the resident dialogue.

A look at the numbers supports the residents' concerns: A traffic data collection from 2023 showed that around 6,812 vehicles pass the road in 24 hours, 424 of which are trucks. The heavy traffic share of around 6 percent is below the normal value of 10 to 12 percent for federal highways. Nevertheless, the Bruchmanns find the traffic to be far too loud. They have been running a guesthouse since April 1990 and often book rooms for guests who do not face the road through in order to escape the noise.

Clear need for action

There is great dissatisfaction among local residents. Despite calls to the city council to build a bypass road, there was no response: the plans were rejected in November 2022. This is not surprising because, as Mayor Kathrin Haese points out, the city has taken measures, but does not have control over the federal highway. Applications for a nighttime speed limit were also unsuccessful because there was supposedly too little traffic at night.

The lack of noise protection in Sternberg is particularly noticeable, while a speed limit for heavy traffic has already been implemented in neighboring towns such as Brüel. Many people wonder why such measures are not possible in their city. Applications for a roundabout failed due to space constraints, and the explained reasons for the differences between cities met with little understanding among the Bruchmanns and their neighbors.

The future in sight

Another meeting with the Ombudsman is already being planned to put the issue back on the agenda. The mayor has promised to pursue the matter further. In view of the statistics on noise reduction on federal highways, which are regularly published by the Federal Ministry for Digital Affairs and Transport, there is legitimate hope for improvements. In 2022, around 186 million euros flowed into noise prevention on federal highways, as the Federal Highway Research Institute reports. Such investments could perhaps soon be felt in Sternberg.

Residents are hungry for change and hope their voices will be heard. Renewed traffic data collections have been announced for winter and spring. Perhaps these further discussions will result in a solution that will allow the Bruchmanns and their neighbors to finally find the peace they have been hoping for. The uncertainty remains, but the will to change is palpable.