The merger of Diekirch, Ettelbruck, Erpeldange-sur-Sûre, Bettendorf, and Schieren to form a large urban centre in northern Luxembourg called Nordstad (“North City”) has been a topic of discussion for decades. During the last legislature, the executive boards (Schäfferot) of the five municipalities achieved some progress before the coronavirus pandemic slowed down the process. But now, in the middle of the campaign for the upcoming local elections, the Diekirch section of the DP appears to have abandoned the project altogether.
On Tuesday, during a programme dedicated to the elections on Radio 100,7, the outgoing DP councillor and co-lead candidate for the municipal elections in Diekirch, José Lopes, declared unequivocally that a merger of the five communes is no longer a priority for the local section of the DP. Lopes argued that the project would not provide “any real added value” to residents and that smaller mergers would be preferable as intermediate steps.
The mayor of Ettelbruck, Jean-Paul Schaaf, disagrees, saying, “I don’t see why we should waste any more years.” Schaaf notes that the project has been in the works for a long time, with the first cooperation agreement dating back to 2006. For the mayor of Ettelbruck “it’s high time we said: we are making a decision.” Schaaf hopes that there will be a referendum on the matter within the next two years.
Claude Gleis, mayor of Erpeldange-sur-Sûre, also still wants a five-way merger. Whether it will be possible to hold a referendum in two years, however, remains to be seen: “People aren’t ready yet, especially in the small municipalities, and we still have work to do in that regard.” Gleis remarks that everything must be meticulously prepared, “and now we are losing another six months because of these elections.” He thinks that two years is an ambitious target; “we’ll try,” he says, “but if it takes a little longer, it won’t be the end of the world for me.”
The mayor of Schieren, Eric Thill, also wants to include the smaller municipalities. On the topic of added value, Thill argues that the project must be designed in such a way that it will be of benefit to local residents, particularly those living in one of the smaller communes.
The outgoing mayor of Bettendorf, Pascale Hansen, is not standing for re-election on 11 June. José Lopes did not specify what the smaller mergers should look like, but for Diekirch this could lead to a merger with Bettendorf.
