[WAZ] Urban development - This is why RKI boss Lothar Wieler listens carefully at Zollverein.

How can we create a city of the future that doesn't make people sick? That is the topic at Zollverein - among other things during a listening walk.
What will a livable city of tomorrow look like? And what do acoustics have to do with it? To find out, a group met at the Zollverein colliery in Essen early in the morning. Here a gate slams shut, there the wind whistles around building walls. Birds pass by, a murmuring group of schoolchildren approaches. Two women quickly lift their wheeled suitcases as they come upon a cluster of people listening intently. Andres Bosshard jokingly calls out to them, "Keep rolling, please. You'll get a fee from me, too." The Swiss is a sound architect and points to the industrial architecture all around: "An eerily beautiful, sleeping city. There used to be a huge din here, and now there's silence." With a group of "urban listening performers," he stands in front of Hall 12 and engages in a sonic experiment. Bosshard calls out loudly, "There's an echo star here. The walls are thinking. They listen to me."