Glacis - Mindens Grüne Lunge

The history of this green ring is anything but relaxed. This "historically evolved cultural landscape", as the Federal Nature Conservation Act describes the city park, goes back to military history. Today's monument with more than 3,500 trees was a defensive installation: the glacis, which translates from French as "slope".
This open field of fire was located in front of the site of the former Prussian fortress of Minden. The former course of the fortifications can still be seen on the city map today. When the Minden fortress was razed after the founding of the German Empire in the 1870s and the vacated areas came into municipal ownership, extensive parks were created on the glacis. The first trees had already begun to grow here a good five decades earlier. The military name "Glacis" was retained for the park.
In the last quarter of the 19th century, a beautification association was founded to preserve, maintain and design the green space, and the city entrusted it with this task. However, the association was disbanded just a few years later and the municipal parks commission took over maintenance.
The design guidelines for the maintenance and planting of the glacis grounds were the views on forest parks developed by Hanoverian city gardener Julius Trip (1857-1907), among others. Towards the end of the 19th century, the so-called Weserglacis was redesigned from the Wesertor to the Schwanenteich pond. The pond was desilted and provided with a small island and a pavilion for waterfowl.
During the Second World War, maintenance of the glacis was stopped completely. Planting of new trees only began in the 1950s. A major redesign then took place in 1973. Benches and lighting were added to the green ring. 20 years later, it was decided to redesign the historic forest park according to plans by Julius Trip, among others.
The Glacis Bridge was built around the same time. The suspension bridge over the Weser was designed by Stuttgart architect Jörg Schlaich, a world-renowned expert in unconventional engineering structures who died in 2021. Including the roof of the Munich Olympic Park. The 177-metre-long pedestrian and cycle bridge connects Minden's city center with the Kanzlers Weide large parking lot and event location on the other bank of the Weser.
For many years, the "Weserfreunde" have been looking after the Glacis on a voluntary basis. They have made it their mission to raise public awareness of this special green lung. This includes a large sandy beach, the Weserstrand on Kanzlers Weide, with a view of the Weserglacis. The redesign and transformation into a high-quality leisure area is currently also a topic of discussion in urban society. In the coming years, changes are planned that will bring an even higher quality of stay to the Minden glacis.