Nature conservation at the Bagger in Thekla: Nothing further will happen here before 2029

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“Due to the budget deficit and the prioritisation of ongoing measures over new ones, no additional investment measures for the implementation of the development plan for the Naturbad Nordost can be included in the 2025/2026 biennial budget.” This is what it sounds like when an administration informs the city council that measures for nature conservation and climate protection – which are actually long overdue – cannot be implemented because the city is being bled dry financially.

In this case, it concerns the Bagger site in Thekla and the Parthe river, which has been channelled there. Another small example of how Leipzig’s financial straits are gradually rendering the city incapable of taking action.

For it is not only in the two-year budget that no funds have been earmarked for the package of measures at the Bagger site, which is actually due to be implemented by 2029. “When drawing up the 2027/2028 two-year budget, it was not possible to include new measures for the Naturbad Nordost within the budgetary ceiling of the Department for Urban Greenery and Waterways,” the Environment Department stated in response to an enquiry from the Greens.

All they really wanted to know, after two years, was the current status of implementation of the package of measures approved by the City Council.

“In 2024, the City Council approved the development concept for the Naturbad Nordost. In addition to the package of measures and investment programme proposed by the administration, a feasibility study on the development of a ‘Nordost District Centre’, a nature and species conservation concept, and a feasibility study on the renaturation of the Parthe were commissioned,” wrote the Green Party parliamentary group in its enquiry. “Two years after the resolution was passed, the status of implementation is of interest.”

Feasibility study for the restoration of the River Parthe has only just been commissioned

Two minor measures have been implemented, according to the Department for the Environment: “March 2025: the ‘Regenbogenfisch’ playground on the south-western bank, as well as a sports and exercise area on the eastern side with three pieces of outdoor fitness equipment and two table tennis tables (opening in March 2025)” and “November 2025: Expansion of the orchard meadow (protected biotope) on the west bank through the planting of eleven cherry trees, two apple trees, one hazelnut tree and one cornel cherry tree.”

That was essentially it, apart from several embankment repairs on the banks of the Nordost natural swimming area, which the locals affectionately call ‘Bagger’.

The most important sub-project of all – the restoration of the Parthe – has been postponed for two years for the time being, because the planning staff are needed for another restoration project: “In the 2025/2026 dual budget, the Department for Urban Greenery and Waterways has no funds available to commission a feasibility study on the restoration of the Parthe. Regardless of this, existing staff resources are being prioritised for the completion of the floodplain development concept and the preparation of the major nature conservation project.

Commissioning a feasibility study on the restoration of the Parthe will be scheduled for the 2027/2028 biennial budget.”

Nature and Species Conservation Concept – in progress

According to the Department for the Environment, the Nature and Species Conservation Concept is already being drawn up.

“As a basis for drawing up the Nature and Species Conservation Concept, extensive surveys of the relevant flora and fauna at the Naturbad Nordost were carried out between March and September 2025. In coordination with the Lower Nature Conservation Authority of the City of Leipzig, this involved surveying biotopes as well as species and species groups relevant to planning – such as breeding birds, reptiles, amphibians, bats – and, on a random basis, other notable species (butterflies, dragonflies, molluscs, beetles and grasshoppers) were recorded.
The results of the surveys, along with potential development areas for species conservation, were presented and discussed during an inter-departmental on-site meeting at the end of January 2026.”

The issue at stake is how the habitats of protected species at the excavation site can actually be protected and how ‘nature-friendly recreation at the Naturbad Nordost’ can be organised. However, according to the Department of the Environment, the concept is currently still undergoing inter-departmental consultation and will only be presented to the City Council’s specialist committee and the public once this process is complete.

Only then can “planning objectives for nature-friendly recreation at the Naturbad Nordost be derived”, according to the Environment Department. Which also means that there will be no planning provisions for this in the 2027/2028 two-year budget. Environmental policy is thus progressing at a snail’s pace and is being further held back by the city’s drastically reduced budgets.