“The opposite of good is not evil, but well intentioned,” author Kurt Tucholsky once said. What he was noticing: A bad action may probably have come from a good intention. With that in mind, the approach taken by the city of Hanover appears commendable, but not well implemented. “The administration has completely escalated,” said Michael Quast (SPD) in the Kirchrode, Bemerode, Wülferode district council.

In the past few weeks, the city had put up a total of 48 parking signs along the Johanneskamp street in the residential district of Kronsberg (Bemerode district) over a distance of a good 460 meters – i.e. one sign every ten meters. Resident Manfred Hormann, for whom the city had also installed blue parking signs directly in front of the front door, speaks of a “sign-citizen prank”.

SPD: “Nice intention, but done completely wrong”

The forest of signs from Kronsberg is the result of a motion by the SPD parliamentary group in the district council, with which the parliamentary group wanted to ban the parking of heavy trucks in the parking bays, especially on the streets of Johanneskamp and Krügerskamp. Consequence: In the past few weeks, city employees have put up a blue parking sign for cars on the side of the road in front of every stop bay or mounted it on lampposts – far too many, not only local resident Manfred Hormann thinks.