City Association Salzburg
The Salzburg City Association is a civic initiative that participates in the urban development and cultural landscape of Salzburg . The association was first founded in 1862 as a so-called city beautification committee. In 1869 it was renamed "Beautification Association" and in 1934 "City Association Salzburg". The association sees itself as the mouthpiece of the “man from the street”, in today's diction as an example of civil society engagement and as a counterweight to an overflowing administration.
history
The first meeting of the City Beautification Committee took place on November 15, 1862, and the 26 founding fathers drew up a statute for an association. The well-known and reform-minded Mayor of Salzburg, Heinrich von Mertens, was elected first chairman in 1863 . Among the founders until 1887 was the local council, secondary school teacher and painter Josef Mayburger . Currently, Mayburger's endeavors to counter the excessive plans for urban expansion and Salzach regulation appear. He and the city beautification committee prevented the demolition of the Monika gate and the bastions on Mönchsberg (the stone blocks should have been used in the regulation of the Salzach ). The Klausentor was also saved from demolition, which threatened it as an alleged obstacle to traffic, and the curved course of the Salzach after the regulation is thanks to Mayburger. Even Makartplatz had to be protected several times (1907, 1927, 1953) against plans to block it after the pawnshop opposite the Trinity Church or to convert it into a parking lot after the pawnshop was demolished. Even in 1958, action had to be taken against the demolition of the attic of the former stables across from the horse pond, which was built according to plans by Johann Bernhard Fischer von Erlach .
The city beautification committee also intervened in the cityscape. In 1863, free access from the city to the Mönchsberg was created (with substantial support from the Empress Dowager Caroline Augusta ). In 1875 the still existing path from Riedenburg to Leopoldskron via Bucklreit was made usable. Paths to and on the Kapuzinerberg were also laid out. The committee also actively advocated the preservation of threatened buildings (e.g. vigilante Söller , Brunnenhaus am Nonnberg, Tomaselli kiosk, bird pavilion in Mirabellgarten). Somewhat mockingly, the association was dubbed the “Bankerl Association” by the Salzburg population because of the many benches it had erected. Hundreds of deciduous trees have been planted on Mönchsberg, on the Salzach quays or in front of Mirabell Palace . Even then, the city guard had to be called in to help against the "bad damage to the plantations by malicious hands"; this also applies to the pear tree on the Walserfeld , which was “sacrilegely felled” in 1875 and then rebuilt with a hawthorn plantation. The renovation of the frescoes by the horse pond on Siegmundsplatz was paid for several times by the association. Various monuments in the city were newly created (marble fountain in Kaiser Franz-Joseph-Park, orientation table on Eduard-Richter-Höhe , Stelzhammer memorial plaque by the sculptor Leo von Moos on June 26, 1927 in Müllner Hauptstrasse, leveling and replanting of the abandoned Nonntal cemetery), some also embellished (1903 Mozart monument, 1913 re-installation of the Pegasus fountain in Mirabell Gardens , transplantation of the Schiller monument by the sculptor Johann Meixner in the former botanical garden near the university's auditorium, today Furtwängler Park, restoration of the corpora of the "Drei Kreuze" in the Schallmooser Hauptstrasse) or bought back again (e.g. various dwarf figures for the so-called dwarf garden in the park of Mirabell Palace ).
The demolition of the Linz Gate in 1893 could not be prevented, although money had already been collected for its renovation. Efforts to rebuild this city gate have surfaced again and again since then (e.g. 1987), mainly because the desire for traffic acceleration has now been replaced by the desire for traffic calming. The association had initially acted successfully against the demolition of the Hexenturm (a historically important part of the city fortifications), but after the bomb damage suffered in 1944, it was demolished.
Significant Salzburg personalities worked at the top of the association, the Salzburg inspector for art education and painter Alois Schmiedbauer (president from 1954 to 1977) can be mentioned as an example .
Today's task
The association used to be as creative as it is today when it comes to obtaining funds to serve the association's purpose (concert and raffle events, house collections, recruiting patrons, now called sponsors). His activities also include the publication of the magazine “Bastei (sheets of the Salzburg City Council for the Preservation and Care of Buildings, Culture and Society)” as well as the publication of an irregular series of publications “Kulturgut der Heimat” (themed issues were “Der Spielmann des Herren. Der Salzburg Franciscan monk Father Peter Singer ”,“ Josef Mayburger - his life and work ”,“ The Neutor ”,“ Salzburg Fountain ”,“ Our Salzburg city mountains ”and much more). Guided tours and trips through the city and state of Salzburg are also intended to raise awareness among Salzburg residents of the city's historical and cultural significance.
literature
- Franz Schirlbauer, Franz Ruedl: Salzburg. Lasting values in good hands. 1862-1987. Salzburg City Association, Salzburg 1987.
- Axel Wagner: 150 years of the municipal association. In Bastei, 61, 2012, pp. 5–23.