What Makes Freiburg Attractive?
By Heidrun, October 2009
 

Last week our mayor welcomed the new students at the University of Freiburg by the words:

"Freiburg tends to make you addicted to it. Once you are here it is very likely you want to stay. It needs a lot of strength if you ever want to leave again."

Well, I am not sure if I would call it addiction, but there is some truth in it. We both came to Freiburg for studying and then we decided to stay. There were times we considered moving somewhere else because of a job, but luckily, the other job option did not become true and we could stay.

So what makes Freiburg so attractive? I can only speak for myself:

Freiburg is a small town, it is a village among the cities. Yet, it is city enough to open many cultural opportunities, such as theatres and exhibitions. Additionally, nature is very close, within a 30 minute train-trip we are in the mountains of the Black Forest, at the Rhine River or somewhere where we can go hiking.

Freiburg is a very colourful city, due to cultural events and certainly due to the university and its students.

Freiburg has very little industry (meaning: few ugly and polluted areas), but is dominated by service sector (the university is the main employer, plus government and clinics). There are many highly educated people and comparable few poor. People tend to be open-minded and interested in social developments. This is not how life is in Germany in general. We are living on a sort of island. But to be honest – we don’t mind, we like this island.

Due to the rather well educated population and especially due to the students Freiburgs politics is rather left wing and green. Our mayor is from the green party – and the conservative party just decided to support him next year, instead of finding an own candidate…who would loose anyway. (However, this makes me think, what are the issues in Green politics?)

In Freiburg it is main stream using the bicycle to work, no matter if you are a professor at university, a physician at the clinic or a waiter. The size of Freiburg allows people to cross the city in about 30 to 45 minutes and it is fairly flat. Additionally we have a very good public transportation system, which makes it easier to get to work, even if it snows and rains.

The climate of Freiburg is warmer than most other German cities; we are called the Toscana of Germany and we like to believe it. In the winter we often sit in the fog because of temperature inversion: But then we take the train up into the black forest which brings us above the clouds and in the beautiful sunshine. In combination of snow…it is brilliant!

Maybe this sounds very pathetic. But we are asked to tell, what makes Freiburg attractive.

As social worker I used to work with people, who were unemployed, poor, low educated, not seldom criminal, etc. Yes, we have these people, too. But in comparison with other parts of Germany, unemployment and social problems are less in Freiburg.

Click here to return to our Vauban is Famous story.