The master urban development plan drawn up by AS+P has now provided Weinheim with a strategic framework for actions to ensure the town has a sustainable future.

In this instance, the master urban development plan is the result of an intensive civic participation process – the “future workshop” – following a project that lasted approximately two years. The contents of this participative process were overseen by AS+P and consisted of a traveling exhibition, three large public forums, two online surveys and themed working parties. In this way, both the relevant stakeholders and the general public were onboarded in the consultative process.

The master urban development plan adopts a holistic approach and addresses multiple issues. It also comprises content on various levels, with overarching objectives forming a central theme, guidelines for concepts at the pan-urban level, and initial approaches to planning that refer to specific sites. This makes it possible to prepare the planning process and set it on the right course at an early stage. The master urban development plan is actually not a list of actions completed ‘once and for all’ but rather a kind of complementary prompt book for activities on the municipal and political levels. It acts as a source of inspiration and a guideline for those assignments that as yet remain unknowns.

However, one of the focuses will be on activating, capitalizing on and developing existing properties while allowing the qualities currently in evidence in Weinheim, such as its parkland, to be preserved. The emphasis is, in other words, on developing the area carefully, with an eye to the future, and with a due sense of moderation.