With the commissioning of the high-speed line, Stuttgart and Ulm are moving closer together. The Ulm-Plochingen section of the line will be officially opened on 9 and 10 December – a special date for Ulm and the region, which have campaigned for decades for the construction of the new line. To kick things off, a delegation from Ulm with Lord Mayor Gunter Czisch and representatives of the local council and “Jugend aktiv” travelled to an “Ulm-Stuttgart Day” on 14 November, where Bernhard Bauer, Chairman of the Stuttgart-Ulm e.V. railway project association, and Stuttgart’s Lord Mayor Dr. Frank Nopper welcomed the delegation to the ITS (InfoTurmStuttgart). The handover of a model of a sparrow from Ulm and a plate with the horse as heraldic animal from Stuttgart symbolised the solidarity of the two cities in this major infrastructure project.
Lord Mayor Gunter Czisch commented on the importance of the new line for Ulm as follows: “The last time we went to Stuttgart with a large group, we campaigned for it, now it is becoming reality: the new line. For our city, this is an event of epochal importance. The decision in favour of Ulm as a stopping point has triggered a whole series of investments in the area around the station that would certainly not have been possible in this form without it. I am thinking of the Sedelhöfe, the Dichterviertel and Wengenviertel or the new mobility hub. Ulm has stepped on the gas and made advance payments, and the next steps will follow with the Regio-S-Bahn and the renovation of Hirschstraße. The fact that Ulm will be connected to the European rail network, the Magistrale, enormously increases Ulm’s attractiveness as a business location, but also as a place to live.
