Winter is here!
The year-round duty to clean public roads also includes snow removal and gritting during the winter months.
Who must clear the roads? When must the roads be cleared? How much snow must be cleared? Answers to these and other questions can be found in the flyer, which is available for download here.
Cycling in winter? But sure!
How much winter maintenance is actually required on bike routes? Where can I ride if the bike path is not cleared? What to do if a path is impassable by bike? Answers to these and other questions can be found in the flyer, which is available for download here.
Statutes, ordinances and other information on street cleaning
- Street Cleaning Ordinance - Ordinance on the Type, Measure and Spatial Extent of the Proper Cleaning of Public Roads, Paths and Squares in the City of Wolfsburg
- Street directory - Annex 1 to the Street Cleaning Ordinance
- Bike lane plan - Annex 2 to the street cleaning ordinance
- Straßenreinigungsübertragungssatzung - Statutes on the bearers and transfer of the duty to clean public streets, roads and squares in the city of Wolfsburg
- Street cleaning fee statutes - Statutes of Wolfsburg Waste Management and Street Cleaning - municipal institution under public law (WAS) - on the levying of street cleaning fees in the city of Wolfsburg
A total of 18,200 properties re-examined
City sends out fee notices for 2018 and 2019 following reorganization of street cleaning services
More than 15,000 notices for street cleaning fees for 2018 and 2019 will be sent out by the City of Wolfsburg to its citizens and businesses in the coming days. Due to a change in the Lower Saxony Street Act, the Wolfsburg City Council had to adopt a new municipal street cleaning ordinance and street cleaning transfer statute on January 1, 2018. The new street cleaning fee statutes issued by Wolfsburg Waste Management and Street Cleaning (WAS) at the same time take account of all the resulting changes.
As a result, the city had to take a new look at a total of around 18,200 properties over the past twelve months. As a result of the legal changes, all streets in the city area had to be reassessed. The now legally required separation of the former standard fee into a separate fee for summer and winter cleaning further increased the expense.
Against this background, the quarterly amounts usually due were not collected last year. These are now budgeted together with the amounts for 2019. The notices for 2018 and 2019 will now be sent to the fee payers. First City Councilor Werner Borcherding and Dr. Herbert Engel, CEO of WAS, now provided information on the details.
The redefinition of all notices for the levying of street cleaning charges in Wolfsburg had become necessary because the city of Wolfsburg had to make mandatory adjustments to its street cleaning ordinance and street cleaning transfer statutes as a result of the drastic changes to the Lower Saxony Street Act. The completely redesigned street directories, including all districts, the new requirements for cost allocation between the city and residents, the new requirements for calculating the individual notices and, in particular, the new version on rear residents had to be taken into account.
The end result was that around 18,200 properties were re-examined and the fees were adjusted to the current legal situation.
The state legislature has now expressly stipulated that 75 percent of the costs of the public street cleaning service are to be covered by user charges (in this case by the adjacent property owners) and 25 percent by the provider of the public service (in this case by the City of Wolfsburg). A deviation from this requirement is no longer possible due to the mandatory legal regulation.
According to the previous legal situation, the general share had to be determined specifically in relation to the local conditions. In the city of Wolfsburg, the general share according to the previous calculation method was significantly higher than the 25 percent share now specified in the law - the share of the fee payer was thus significantly lower than 75 percent.
The new version of the Lower Saxony Road Act also has drastic consequences for Wolfsburg in the treatment of residential properties in the districts. In the past, street cleaning in these areas was carried out by WAS, especially on through roads and on roads with public transport. Nevertheless, no street cleaning fees were charged. The costs incurred in this respect were borne by the City of Wolfsburg. This is now no longer permissible. Street cleaning charges must now be levied throughout the entire city area according to the actual scope of services and the legally defined cost allocation.
In addition, the recent case law of the Lüneburg Higher Administrative Court (OVG Lüneburg) has now set binding requirements for the front meter scale of the property adjacent to the street with public street cleaning that forms the basis for the assessment of charges. The Lüneburg Higher Administrative Court has now also laid down specific requirements for the assessment of so-called "rear land".
The levying of uniform street cleaning fees for summer and winter cleaning is now also only permissible if unequal treatment of the fee debtors is excluded. Because not all streets are cleaned to the same extent in summer and winter, a uniform fee for all streets is now no longer possible according to the revised scope of services of the WAS based on the requirements of the new municipal street cleaning ordinance. In such cases, current case law requires that separate summer and winter cleaning fees must be set.
The current fee calculation is based on a two-year calculation from January 1, 2018 to December 31, 2019 (Section 7 Street Cleaning Fee Statutes). The collection period is the calendar quarter. Due to the time-consuming recalculation, it was not possible to have new fee notices ready in 2018. These will now be sent to the fee payers at the beginning of January 2019. They contain the determination of the street cleaning fees for the years 2018 and 2019. The four quarterly fees from 2018 will be levied together with the 1st quarterly fee in 2019 on the due date of February 15, 2019.
| Summer Cleaning | |
| Fee requirement 2018 2019 |
3.24 million euros |
| Cleaning performance of WAS |
around 658 kilometers (658,000 front meters) |
| Winter cleaning | |
| Fee requirement 2018 2019 |
0.93 million euros |
| Cleaning performance of WAS |
Approximately 452 kilometers (452,000 front meters) |
| Comparison of the fee rates |
2017 Unit fee
|
2018/2019 Summer cleaning |
2018/2019 Winter cleaning |
2018/2019 Summer and
Winter cleaning
|
| Amounts in Euro | ||||
| Cleaning class I | 5,50 | 4,92 | 2,04 | 6,96 |
| Cleaning class II | 11,00 | 9,84 | 2,04 | 11,88 |
| Cleaning class III | 16,50 | 14,76 | 2,04 | 16,80 |
| Cleaning class IV | 2,75 | 2,46 | 2,04 | 4,50 |
| Cleaning class V | 22,00 | 19,68 | 2,04 | 21,72 |
The street directory of the street cleaning ordinance of the City of Wolfsburg is decisive for the allocation of a property to the cleaning classes in summer cleaning and for the allocation to winter cleaning. The fees are annual fees per front meter of the property subject to the fee.
Questions about the fee notice can be addressed to the contact person listed in the notice or by calling the public authority number 115. All information about street cleaning, the current ordinances, statutes and directories can be found at the top of this page.
Furthermore, information flyers on the subject of street cleaning are available in the town halls A and B, the branch offices in Fallersleben and Vorsfelde, as well as in all call boxes in the districts.