In the local area, down around Rudesheim....there is this group referred to as "Rheintal 21".
Their protest is centered around the trains that pass through the region.....day and night....with the noise associated with them.
Now, it's not like this is a new issue or a new rail network. This particular line....along the Rhein River from Wiesbaden to Koln....has been around for over a hundred years. Probably half the folks around Rudesheim probably haven't ridden the local railway in thirty years.
What the protest group generally says is that speed limits need to be observed, and some limits on night-time usage. They also hint that freight usage ought to be discontinued on this railway and be done elsewhere (probably to irk other folks more, my hunch). They also talk up pollution (?) which comes from the freight trains and how it affects the Rhein River.....I'm kinda puzzled over that one but at least they are creative with imagination.
They claim six-hundred train pass daily. I'm mostly on disbelief for that one and I doubt if they see more than eighty trains per day.....the vast majority between 6AM and 6PM.
It's kinda hard to find any significant German community without a protest group these days....either about bridges, lack of bridges, speed limits, new housing going up, subway expansion, subway closure, etc. The list probably would encompass three-hundred different feel-bad situations. Not to say Germans are whiney or such.....but if you wanted to start a protest group over the lack of a statue in your town's city park.....you'd probably get twenty-five people to come out on the first night of organizing.
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