Ministry of Urban Development and Environment

The ministry’s mission is to preserve and further develop Hamburg as a green city on the river. Accordingly the range of topics is broad – from climate and energy to the city railway and even the major urban development project “Sprung über die Elbe” (“Jump Across the Elbe River”).

The Ministry of Urban Development and Environment is responsible for

• tasks in transportation policy and in traffic (development of measures in road and rail traffic including order management for the Federal Government) as well as the local public transport,

• planning, design and execution of new, reconstruction and extension measures and of maintenance for urban main roads and highways, for maintenance, for repair, and operation of bridges, tunnels, and other civil engineering facilities in the public easement of Hamburg and the Federal Government, for operations, maintenance, repair, and modernization of facilities for city lighting and traffic lights, for planning, construction and maintenance of installations for flood control and surface water,

• all ministerial and central tasks in the area of building regulation/construction supervision and in governmental building construction (state and federal construction projects),

• the state and regional planning policy for Hamburg, the regional planning and regional collaboration with neighbouring states, the town planning and the landscape planning in the interest of the whole city, for city and landscape planning concepts and projects, in particular those involved in the key project “Sprung über die Elbe,” for the preparation and accompaniment of EU projects with territorial reference,

• housing and housing policy, the promotion of housing construction, for ministerial tasks in urban renewal and real estate regulation.

In addition the Ministry of Urban Development and Environment is responsible for or coordinates Hamburg’s governmental measures regarding the environment, in particular:

• advancement of environmental awareness and sustainable development,

• protection and cultivation of bodies of water as well as water supply planning,

• protection and regeneration of soil,

• examination and restoration of brownfields,

• waste industry planning and waste legislation authorisation,

• greenspace planning and protection of nature,

• air and water pollution control planning as well as adequate authorisation and monitoring tasks,

• energy supply planning as well as climate protection and energy policies,

• aircraft noise protection and noise reduction planning.