German municipalities publish a waste calendar, the Abfallkalender, for each year. The Regensburg calendar for 2026 explains how to use it. Look up your street, note the district numbers for residual waste, paper and recycling, and read the dates off the monthly pages. A changed collection day is marked with the letter Ä. The bins must be out by 6 a.m. on collection day and no more than 24 hours before. Residual waste bins may stand no more than 10 meters from the truck’s regular stopping place. Fulda’s waste information for 2026 lists, holiday by holiday, which collection of residual and organic waste moves to which day.
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The Typically German Wish
Lutz Goebel has chaired the National Regulatory Control Council since 2022. In February 2025, Legal Tribune Online interviewed him. The interviewer recalled his criticism of the kräftezehrenden typisch deutschen Wunsch nach Einzelfallgerechtigkeit, the exhausting, typically German wish for justice in each individual case. Goebel said that municipal staff suffer under small-scale laws that are hard to understand. He proposed lump sums and thresholds below which small cases are not pursued. Wir können uns nicht noch mehr Berichtspflichten, Kontrollen und Beauftragte leisten. (We cannot afford even more reporting duties, controls and commissioners.)
The Federal Transport Plan
The Bundesverkehrswegeplan 2030, the federal transport infrastructure plan, was presented to the Bundestag in August 2016. It plans 269.6 billion euros of federal investment in roads, railways and waterways up to 2030. About 69 percent is for maintaining the existing networks. A new plan is drawn up every 10 to 15 years. A chamber of commerce notes that the previous plan, of 2003, did not succeed in delivering its priority projects.
A Fixed Place for the Future
Seit 2004 hat die Zukunft einen festen Platz im Deutschen Bundestag. Since 2004, the future has had a fixed place in the German Bundestag. This is how the Bundestag’s own chronicle introduces its Parliamentary Advisory Council on Sustainable Development. The council follows the federal sustainability strategy adopted in 2002. Its review of government bills has become part of the normal legislative process. The chronicle states the principle as responsibility for the people living today genauso wie für künftige Generationen, just as much as for future generations.
The Plan Behind Every Budget
Section 50 of the Budget Principles Act states: Bund und Länder legen ihrer Haushaltswirtschaft je für sich eine fünfjährige Finanzplanung zugrunde. (The federation and the states each base their budget management on a five-year financial plan.) The plan must be presented at the latest together with the draft budget law for the next year. A second law, the Stability and Growth Act, requires the plan to be adjusted and extended every year.
Summer Holidays Fixed Years Ahead
On 13 December 2021, the conference of education ministers fixed the start and end of the summer holidays in all 16 states for the years 2025 to 2030. Five groups of states rotate, so that the holidays are staggered across the country. The reasons given included Planungssicherheit, planning certainty, for schools, families and tourism. In this system, Bavaria and Baden-Württemberg come last, because of their Pentecost holidays. By August 2026, negotiations on the dates from 2031 were under way. Several states want to end the special position of the two southern states. Bavaria’s premier Markus Söder replied: Auf keinen Fall. Wir ändern die Ferien nicht. (No way. We are not changing the holidays.)
One Meal a Day
The German state keeps its own food reserves, managed by the Federal Office for Agriculture and Food. The Bundesreserve Getreide, the federal grain reserve, held 582,000 tonnes of soft wheat, 56,000 tonnes of oats and 67,000 tonnes of rye at the end of 2021. The Zivile Notfallreserve, the civil emergency reserve, held about 126,000 tonnes of rice and pulses and about 5,000 tonnes of condensed milk. In a crisis, the reserves are meant to provide every citizen with at least one meal a day. The current quantities are not published, for reasons of secrecy.
The Compulsory Fire Brigade
In Germany, fire protection is a duty of the municipality. According to the German Fire Brigade Association, there are volunteer fire brigades in all municipalities. If too few people volunteer, state law has a next step. In Schleswig-Holstein, for example, the municipality must then set up a Pflichtfeuerwehr, a compulsory fire brigade, and residents aged 18 to 50 can be required to serve. In 2018, the Baltic Sea resort of Grömitz decided to set one up, after its active members had fallen from 210 to 150.
The Warning Day That Failed
On 10 September 2020, Germany held its first nationwide warning day. The alarm was planned for 11 a.m. The warnings in the apps NINA and KATWARN arrived on phones more than half an hour late. Many connected control centers had triggered warnings on their own, alongside the central one, and the system was overloaded. The agreed concept had provided for activation by the federal government only. Christoph Unger, president of the Federal Office of Civil Protection and Disaster Assistance for 16 years, was replaced. The warning day of 2021 was canceled, while the office built a full test environment.
The Gas Emergency Plan
The German gas emergency plan, the Notfallplan Gas, has three stages: the Frühwarnstufe, early warning, the Alarmstufe, alert, and the Notfallstufe, emergency. The early warning stage was declared on 30 March 2022, and a crisis team was set up. On 23 June 2022, after Russia sharply cut deliveries through Nord Stream 1, the Federal Ministry for Economic Affairs declared the alert stage. In the emergency stage, the Federal Network Agency would decide who receives how much gas. Private households, hospitals and other protected customers would be supplied until the very end.