Conservation statute
Preservation statutes (in municipalities such as Hamburg maintenance ordinances ) are building statutes that can be issued by the municipalities in Germany on the basis of the special urban planning law from the Building Code (BauGB). The legal basis for this is §§ 172 ff. BauGB. There are therefore three protection goals that can justify the establishment of a conservation statute:
- the preservation of the urban character of an area on the basis of its urban design
- the so-called milieu protection , i.e. the preservation of the composition of the resident population or
- support for urban restructuring.
In the scope of a conservation statute, demolition ("dismantling"), changes or changes in use require (additional) approval from the municipality. In doing so, it is checked against the standard of the conservation goals of the respective statutes whether the measure is permissible. With the statutes described under 1 above, even the construction of new structures requires a corresponding permit. This permit requirement is independent of any possible state law exemption from approval according to the building regulations of the respective state.
Preservation of the urban character of an area
The conservation statute for this purpose is considered to be “municipal monument protection ”, because it allows a municipality to protect quarters or city districts from unwanted or disadvantageous changes, regardless of the state monument protection. It can ensure that new buildings blend in more closely with their surroundings than would be possible under Section 34 of the BauGB ( insertion requirement ), for example the use of a gable roof , the type and color of roofing, window formats and facade colors . All that is required is a well-founded justification in the statutes. An incompletely preserved area can be further developed in a certain direction by means of a conservation statute. The subject of such statutes are often streets or quarters preserved in a uniform or largely uniform style, but also building areas of the same or similar structure, that is, those with an “urban peculiarity”. The latter must be defined, but it can be taken broadly. Even if the conservation statute is fundamentally inventory-oriented, the municipality thus has options for influencing the building and its urban development, which is usually not available to it through the development plan. In contrast to the development plan , a maintenance statute does not require an establishment procedure.
Milieu protection statutes
Preservation statutes in accordance with Section 172 Paragraph 1 Clause 1 No. 2 BauGB in the form of environmental protection statutes are recognized by the jurisprudence. These can be issued for an area with any type of resident population, provided that their composition is to be preserved for special urban planning reasons. The aim of the statutes is to secure the existence of the environment for people living in an intact area and thus to protect the population structure in a certain district from undesired changes. This urban development objective is the decisive content criterion for the delimitation of the area of a conservation statute. Reasons are suitable that relate to the specific situation and therefore “special” urban development objectives justify the adoption of a conservation statute (see Section 1 (9 ) BauNVO ).
