The castle restaurant in Oberschleißheim has been closed for six and a half years.
It is being renovated.
Still.
The Greens are now complaining about wasting taxpayers' money.
Oberschleißheim
- If you want to get that beer garden feeling in the Schlosswirtschaft again, you have to go to the museum.
There is a painting by Franz Quaglio in the Lenbachhaus in Munich.
It shows men drinking beer, women in long clothes and card players in front of the restaurant in Oberschleißheim.
That was in 1874. Today, almost 150 years later, the Schlosswirtschaft is a building site.
Still.
The last beer flowed from the tap here in October 2014.
The anger about the delay is growing.
The castle economy belongs to the Bavarian Castle Administration.
According to the authorities, the restaurant had to be completely renovated: the guest area will be merged, the kitchen courtyard will be relocated to the south-west, the beer garden tavern will be rebuilt and the former allotment gardens in the west will be converted into a green area.
Alpine hut already dismantled
The repair work on the historic roof trusses and pipe installations in the underground is currently in progress, writes the lock administration upon request.
The shell of the new beer garden building has been erected, work on the facades and the interior work including the technology have begun.
Construction work originally began in October 2019, although the castle restaurant has been closed since 2014.
As a provisional, a hosted "alpine hut" was set up until last November.
The reasons for the late start of construction are several award procedures, planning work and the budget participation of the state parliament, reports the palace administration.
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Popular alpine hut: Workers dismantle wooden elements on the former beer garden.
© Dieter Michalek
“I can't understand why the work takes so long,” says Oberschleißheim's Mayor Markus Böck (CSU).
"Sure", it is an old building, but the delays are "very unsatisfactory".
Markus Büchler, the Oberschleißheim member of the state parliament of the Greens, calls for the renovation to be finally completed.
“The castle economy is a typical example of how the Free State operates: A lot of money is burned,” complains Büchler.
In July 2018, the state parliament approved 10.3 million euros for the renovation work.
In the past few years the costs have increased by over two million euros.
The state parliament had therefore pumped another 2.4 million euros last December.
The budget spokeswoman for the Greens in the state parliament, Claudia Köhler, criticized: "If you had acted in good time and not put the measures on the back burner, the additional costs would certainly not have been so high".
Everyone knows that delaying construction work for years will increase costs.
In addition, there is the loss of lease income, adds Markus Büchler.
The lock administration writes: "The increased costs are due on the one hand to increases in wages and material prices and on the other hand to construction-related changes in dimensions and design".
Those are the greens for the delay
During building archaeological excavations, foundation walls of the previous building were found, "which were only partially known before," according to the authority.
The historical evidence would have made the planning and construction work more difficult.
The installation had to be relocated.
In addition, there were “additional costs that could not be planned”: shallow foundations, building waterproofing, external doors and windows - the list is long.
Construction workers would also have had to dispose of harmful contaminated sites such as asbestos, contaminated building rubble and artificial mineral fibers.
The green politicians in the state parliament are faced with the delay - also in the context of the pandemic: "Schleissheim Palace is a popular excursion destination in the area and would have been necessary not least in the Corona summer," says Büchler.
Mayors, possible tenants, state parliament politicians and citizens - all hope that the restaurant will open soon.
But they still have to be patient.
"The completion of the construction project is planned for spring 2022", announced the palace administration.
The extent to which the pandemic will affect the rest of the process cannot yet be foreseen.
If there are further delays, there is still the painting in the Lenbachhaus in Munich.
More news from Oberschleißheim and the Munich district can be found here.
