Once a military parade ground for the Prussian army and later famously the base for the Berlin Airlift, Tempelhofer Feld, as it is now officially called, opened to the public as a recreational area in 2010. Stretching out over more than 300 hectares, it is one of the largest green urban spaces in the world and a favorite for locals and tourists alike.

Now, once discarded plans to build here are gaining new momentum.

The Berlin government would like to see the construction of numerous five to ten-storey buildings and several individual high-rise buildings, shrinking the central inner meadow area from 305 to to 180 hectares. Fifty percent of the built-up area would become commercial space.

Plans to develop the former airfield were scuppered by a locally-organized referendum in 2014. However, incoming chancellor Friedrich Merz, of the conservative Christian Democrats (CDU), spoke out in the run-up to the federal elections in February suggesting politicians must be prepared to build on the land even if it is against the will of local residents.

The lack of affordable housing and skyrocketing rents in Germany has become perhaps the most pressing social issue of the century. There is a shortage of over 800,00 apartments, according to the Federal Statistical Office, and the median monthly asking rent in Berlin has risen by 85.2% from €8.50 per square meter in 2015 to €15.74 in 2024.

To tackle the problem, Germany's incoming coalition government of the Christian Democrats and Christian Social Union (CDU/CSU) and the center-left Social Democrats (SPD) has

© Deutsche Welle