In 2024, the Vie et Lumière association, which organises this gathering in Grostenquin, preferred to cancel it due to the Paris Olympic Games, as such a gathering mobilises large numbers of law enforcement officers who were requisitioned for the Olympics at that time.
Grostenquin is a French commune in the department of Moselle, which is approximately an hour and a half drive from Luxembourg’s border with France.
This year, however, it seems that Travellers could return to the large Moselle air base this September, reports Le Républicain Lorrain. According to the local newspaper, the elected representatives of the Casas (Saint-Avold Synergie conurbation committee) unanimously decided at the last plenary session to oppose this evangelical gathering.
However, the state could override the local decision. Casas president Salvatore Coscarella warned that if the evangelical gathering goes ahead in Grostenquin–by order of the state and against the wishes of local representatives–they will take all necessary steps to express their opposition, reports Le Républicain Lorrain.
On behalf of the Moselle Federation of Mayors and Presidents of the Establishments of Intermunicipal Cooperation (EPCI), President François Grosdidier has also sent a letter to the French Minister of Home Affairs Bruno Retailleau warning him that the event, which brings together more than 40,000 people, is causing problems in terms of safety, public health, and public tranquility. Grosdidier also stresses that holding this event makes no sense from an ecological point of view, as it takes place close to an area classified as Natura 2000.
He described the fact that “Travellers have a habit of going to this listed site to relieve themselves”. He further stated that “the damage to the environment is not limited to the presence of human faeces, since at the end of the gathering, we have to deal with other kinds of waste left on site”.
Despite former Prime Minister Edouard Philippe’s commitment in 2017 that the event would no longer be held in Grostenquin, it was nevertheless renewed in 2023.
