Runway 18 West (German Startbahn 18 West) is a 4000-meter-long runway that runs from north to south on the western edge of Frankfurt Airport. A small northern portion of the runway is located in the Frankfurt district of Flughafen, while the larger southern portion lies in the Rüsselsheim am Main district. Before going into operation in 1984, the runway met with considerable opposition, becoming an important symbol of the German environmental movement in the 1970s and 1980s.
History
Planning In 1962, Frankfurt Airport/Main AG, Frankfurt Rhein-Main Airport's operating company, decided to design a new arrivals terminal and a third runway. Dramatic growth in air traffic had pushed both the old airport buildings and adjoining railway system, which still exist to this day, to their limits. The Rhine-Main region was experiencing a steady economic upswing, thanks in no small part to the role played by Frankfurt Airport as a European airline hub. Airport expansion was complicated because the site was completely surrounded by forests, including protected Bannwald areas. Other obstacles included the east-to-west Bundesautobahn 3 north of the airport, the north-to-south Bundesautobahn 5 to the east, an overhead power line to the west, and the now-closed U.S. Rhein-Main Air Base to the south. Only the southwest corner of the airport offered the possibility of building a new runway, running north to south. But this would entail both immense logging operations and extension of the airport to a municipal area not belonging to the Frankfurt metropolitan zone. Economic factors took precedence over environmental considerations and on 28 December 1965, Flughafen AG applied for a construction permit for "Runway 18 West". In May 1966, the Hessian Parliament (Landtag) decided to build a new 4000-metre-long, north-south runway. Following the approval, Frankfurt Airport/Main AG decided in November 1967 to build the new runway at a cost of DM 78 million. At a time of increasing environmental awareness, more and more citizens grew skeptical about the airport expansion. Following planning approval by the Transportation Minister in March 1968, 44 legal actions for cancellation of the project (Anfechtungsklagen in German) were brought before the courts.
Lawsuits Frankfurt Airport's Terminal Mitte (now Terminal 1) opened in March 1972 and the planning approval procedure for the new Runway 18 West was initiated the following year. The result was more than 100 lawsuits brought before Hessian administrative courts. Runway opponents, who increasingly joined forces in citizens' initiatives (BI), were growing in number, as both reduced flights and the 1973 oil crisis mitigated the need for a new runway. Some runway opponents also feared it could be used by NATO. Administrative courts dealt with the planned expansion for nearly a decade before construction approval was annulled for technical reasons. In March 1971, the Transportation Ministry issued a second planning approval order, which again ended up before the courts. At the end of 1978, a citizens' initiative (BI) against the expansion was founded, principally in the affected town of Mörfelden-Walldorf, but also in Frankfurt and areas surrounding the airport. In July 1978, the Federal Administrative Court referred runway opponents' claims back to the Hessian Administrative Court. In December that year, the State of Hesse sold 303 hectares of land to Frankfurt Airport/Main AG for the construction of the new runway. The expected logging zone amounted to 129 hectares.
Intensification of the conflict When the Hessian Administrative Court ruled in favor of the new runway construction on 21 October 1980, the legal dispute ended but resistance on the ground intensified. On the planned site of Runway 18 West, opponents erected a citizens' initiative (BI) hut as of May 1980, using it as an information kiosk for people walking in the area. In July, Hessian Minister of Economics and Transport Heinz-Herbert Karry (FDP), ordered the "immediate implementation" of runway construction. In October however, the Hessian Administrative Court rejected this stop request, restoring the construction halt. Yet the first tree felling work began before the winter for technical reasons. First, a seven-hectare site was cleared directly at the airport site. On 2 November 1980, 15,000 people, mainly environmentalists and students, as well as numerous elderly people from the region, demonstrated at the edge of the forest in Walldorf. Since planned occupation actions by protesters failed due to long-running police efforts, the citizens' initiative group decided to expand its "BI-Hütte" into a permanently inhabited village to be able to react more quickly and effectively to potential land seizure and clearing operations. As a result, several illegal huts were built, in addition to a hut church of the Walldorf parish, on airport grounds.
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