The End is Not So Near

What could be considered the final round of realistic talks on the Stuttgart 21 issue (the new railway project destined to take ten years) started yesterday.

Stern reports that things are going to be difficult in terms of any middle ground.  Several options that the Greens wanted....will not be part of the negotiation.

One example: a vote locally on the project....which lawyers from the region did agree that it opened various legal questions.  You could have a case where the public might use this as a reason to question every single road or infrastructure project for years to come....which wouldn't help the city or the public.

The odds of any acceptance by the Greens?  Based on a dozen newspaper readings from the region....I'd bet on no acceptance and some kind of court challenge to move forward.  Toss in the election in the spring and you've got a four-star mess.

Adding to this deal is an effort to edge out and prevent land or property speculation along the routes affected. The Greens wanted this on the table and it represents their wave of the hat to the commoner in the city.  One could sit and speculate that various routes were drawn five years ago and people went into affected areas at the time and bought property then....knowing that it'd go up in ten years.  It's a common practice and gets speculators ahead of the game.

Bottom line?  I expect no happy campers from these talks and the March elections will be the next round of "answers".  You can imagine a bunch of politicians standing there now....wondering how exactly they can fix this to make people happy.  And if you were wondering what land speculators are doing?  I'm betting they are meeting with opposition politicians (probably not the Greens) and charming them with various ideas of stopping this entire discussion.  Another election by the end of 2011?  Yeah....you might want to start thinking about some talk over this and some hurt feelings from non-results.