The Lene Voigt Park is a park in the

locality Locality may refer to: * Locality, a historical named location or place in Canada * Locality (association), an association of community regeneration organizations in England * Locality (linguistics) * Locality (settlement) * Suburbs and localitie ...

of Reudnitz in the district south-east of

Leipzig Leipzig (, ; ; Upper Saxon: ; ) is the most populous city in the States of Germany, German state of Saxony. The city has a population of 628,718 inhabitants as of 2023. It is the List of cities in Germany by population, eighth-largest city in Ge ...

Germany Germany, officially the Federal Republic of Germany, is a country in Central Europe. It lies between the Baltic Sea and the North Sea to the north and the Alps to the south. Its sixteen States of Germany, constituent states have a total popu ...

. It was opened in 2004 and named on 13 July 2005 after the

Upper Saxon German Upper Saxon (, , ) is an East Central German dialect spoken in much of the modern German state of Saxony and in adjacent parts of southeastern Saxony-Anhalt and eastern Thuringia. As of the early 21st century, it is mostly extinct and a new r ...

dialect A dialect is a Variety (linguistics), variety of language spoken by a particular group of people. This may include dominant and standard language, standardized varieties as well as Vernacular language, vernacular, unwritten, or non-standardize ...

poet Lene Voigt (1891–1962), who lived in the adjacent Reichpietschstraße (then Nostitzstraße) from 1920 to 1925.

Description

The long and to wide park takes its shape from the site of the former train station

Leipzig Eilenburger Bahnhof Leipzig Eilenburger Bahnhof was a railway station in Leipzig that served as a passenger station on the Leipzig–Eilenburg railway line from 1874 to 1942. A large part of the former railway site is now Lene Voigt Park. History By the year Leipz ...

, on which it lies. It is in the form of an elongated

rectangle In Euclidean geometry, Euclidean plane geometry, a rectangle is a Rectilinear polygon, rectilinear convex polygon or a quadrilateral with four right angles. It can also be defined as: an equiangular quadrilateral, since equiangular means that a ...

oriented west–east. On three sides, the park is bordered by streets at the same level, whereas the street Riebeckstrasse is higher on the east side. It crosses the former

railway line Rail transport (also known as train transport) is a means of transport using wheeled vehicles running in tracks, which usually consist of two parallel steel rails. Rail transport is one of the two primary means of land transport, next to road ...

on a bridge, along which the park's main path, also called the main promenade, continues eastwards as a

rail trail A rail trail or railway walk is a shared-use path on a Right of way#Rail right of way, railway right of way. Rail trails are typically constructed after a railway has been abandoned and the track has been removed but may also share the rail corr ...

out of the park. The wide main promenade runs straight and opens up the park along its entire length. On its north side, the main promenade is lined with

birch A birch is a thin-leaved deciduous hardwood tree of the genus ''Betula'' (), in the family Betulaceae, which also includes alders, hazels, and hornbeams. It is closely related to the beech- oak family Fagaceae. The genus ''Betula'' contains 3 ...

trees and a wall made of wire

gabion A gabion (from Italian ''gabbione'' meaning "big cage"; from Italian ''gabbia'' and Latin ''cavea'' meaning "cage") is a cage, cylinder or box filled with rocks, concrete, or sometimes sand and soil for use in civil engineering, road building ...

s, into which seating is embedded. On the south side of the main promenade there is a wide strip of lawn with trees, which is open to public use. To the south of this, the park is closed off by a ribbon-like structure in which squares planted with

robinia ''Robinia'' is a genus of flowering plants in the family Fabaceae, tribe Robinieae, native to North America. Commonly known as locusts, they are deciduous trees and shrubs growing tall. The leaves are pinnate with 7–21 oval leaflets. The flowe ...

trees, hedge cabinets and a variety of sports and games facilities alternate, such as

table tennis Table tennis (also known as ping-pong) is a racket sport derived from tennis but distinguished by its playing surface being atop a stationary table, rather than the Tennis court, court on which players stand. Either individually or in teams of ...

tables, playing fields as well as opportunities for

boules Boules (, ), or ''jeu de boules'', is a collective name for a wide range of games similar to bowls and bocce in which the objective is to throw or roll heavy balls as closely as possible to a small target ball, called the ''jack''. 'Boules' its ...

inline skating Inline skating is a multi-disciplinary sport and can refer to a number of activities practiced using inline skates. Inline skates typically have two to five polyurethane wheels depending on the style of practice, arranged in a single line by a ...

climbing Climbing is the activity of using one's hands, feet, or other parts of the body to ascend a steep topographical object that can range from the world's tallest mountains (e.g. the eight thousanders) to small boulders. Climbing is done for locom ...

and much more. Some rotating

weathering steel Weathering steel, often referred to by the genericised trademark COR-TEN steel and sometimes written without the hyphen as corten steel, is a group of steel alloys that form a stable external layer of rust that eliminates the need for painting ...

elements are striking. Lenes Tauscho Lene-Voigt-Park

Since 2021, the exchange cabinet "Lenes Tauscho" has been located at the eastern end of the park. It fell victim to

vandalism Vandalism is the action involving deliberate destruction of or damage to public or private property. The term includes property damage, such as graffiti and defacement directed towards any property without permission of the owner. The t ...

in 2023 but was subsequently rebuilt.

Side effects of high usage pressure

In response to an inquiry in 2024, the city acknowledged the negative side effects of the high usage pressure to which the park is exposed, particularly from spring to autumn. These side effects included wear and tear on the

lawn A lawn () is an area of soil-covered land planted with Poaceae, grasses and other durable plants such as clover lawn, clover which are maintained at a short height with a lawn mower (or sometimes grazing animals) and used for aesthetic an ...

, pollution, and

noise Noise is sound, chiefly unwanted, unintentional, or harmful sound considered unpleasant, loud, or disruptive to mental or hearing faculties. From a physics standpoint, there is no distinction between noise and desired sound, as both are vibrat ...

. As a countermeasure, publicly accessible sanitary facilities (

urine-diverting dry toilet A urine-diverting dry toilet (UDDT) is a type of dry toilet with urine diversion that can be used to provide safe, affordable sanitation in a variety of contexts worldwide. The separate collection of feces and urine without any flush water has ...

s) for free were installed in December 2023, which had already been used 15,000 times in just a few months.

Award

The Lene Voigt Park was awarded the

European Prize for Urban Public Space The European Prize for Urban Public Space is a biennial award established in 2000 to recognise public space projects. It is organised by the Centre de Cultura Contemporània de Barcelona together with six other European institutions: The Architectu ...

in 2002. This was intended to particularly recognize the

public participation Public participation, also known as citizen participation or patient and public involvement, is the inclusion of the public in the activities of any organization or project. Public participation is similar to but more inclusive than stakeholder e ...

in the planning process.

Drinking fountain

Since September 2020, a

drinking fountain A drinking fountain, also called a water fountain or water bubbler, is a fountain designed to provide drinking water. It consists of a basin with either continuously running water or a tap. The drinker bends down to the stream of water and s ...

is in operation from spring to autumn on the north side of Reichpietschstrasse.

References

External links

* {{Commons category, Lene-Voigt-Park (Leipzig), Lene Voigt Park, audio=0, video=0 Parks in Leipzig