Businesses in the city center remain closed
Markus Frank on the ban on Sunday opening by the Hessian Administrative Court
(kus) City Councillor Markus Frank is disappointed by the recent ruling of the Hessian Administrative Court (VGH). After the Frankfurt Administrative Court confirmed the book fair as the reason for the Sunday open for sale and the decision made by the city, the VGH on Friday, October 21 overturned this decision and again required a spatial reference to the fair. "With this decision, the open Sunday for the entire city of Frankfurt am Main is virtually no longer possible," notes City Councillor Markus Frank. Only one by the close location to the fair particularly privileged shopping center to let open, is not in the interest of our many thousand visitors of the book fair, which are everywhere in the city on the way. "With its decision, the court fails to recognise that the purpose of a Sunday open for sales is not to favour individual shops and to exclude the rest of the retail trade from the possibility of opening shops, which is given in the law."
The decision was also astonishing, Frank said, because last year the court considered a Sunday open for sales in the entire city on the occasion of much smaller trade fairs, namely Paperworld, Christmasworld and Creative World, to be justified. In the decision of 29 January 2015 at that time, it literally reads: "After all, 80,0000 people who additionally flock to the city represent a city the size of Gießen. Such a flow of visitors cannot be regarded as inconsiderable even in Frankfurt am Main. However, the restriction sought by the applicant - e.g. only to the exhibition grounds - would not be compatible with the purpose of opening on Sundays. Among other things, this is intended to ensure equal treatment of traders."
If the legal situation remains unchanged, it should not be at the disposition of the courts whether a Sunday open for sale, which is prepared and planned under the legally permissible conditions, takes place or not. For now, according to the court, a fair of 100,000 visitors should not be sufficient for the urban area and, moreover, should be limited to individual branches of business. "The legislator must clarify this urgently, so that contradictory decisions do not come about with an unchanged legal situation", demands Councillor Markus Frank again. He regrets that the retailers are now again taken by the lawsuit of ver.di an important opportunity to present their service and the work and costs invested in the Sunday were in vain
