Berlin. Culture and art in abundance, cheap rents and, despite all the breathlessness, a certain “feeliness” in the neighborhood – in the opinion of many capital city residents, this promise from Berlin to the Republic is a thing of the past. Before the election of the state parliament this Sunday, the often rough everyday life in the largest metropolis between Paris and Moscow is the talk of the town. Are there still affordable apartments? Where does the wild pile of rubbish in front of my front door come from again? And: Should a socialist rule Berlin, part of which was considered a frontline city for the West?
“The city looks down on itself and what it sees is ugly.” This is how a correspondent for the “Frankfurter Allgemeine Sonntagszeitung” described the current self-image last week. In fact, littering and neglect of public spaces was a prominent election campaign issue. The newly crowned CDU top candidate Stefan Evers suggested that welfare recipients should be encouraged to keep Berlin clean. The SPD and the Left want to have bulky waste picked up free of charge again. The Greens are backing a packaging tax that is intended to prevent waste and make those responsible pay.
It is also noticeable that many homeless people are camping in the city this summer - along the canals and in parks or urban green spaces, where children's birthdays were usually celebrated or people lay in the sun on meadows. Numerous squares, streets and subway stations are still heavily frequented by drug users, which affects some citizens' sense of security.
Eating out cheaply and tasty at the same time – that is no longer standard either. There are still a lot of very good restaurants, but prices have risen more sharply than in the rest of the country due to the surge in inflation in recent years.
It cannot be clearly proven whether Berlin is less popular as a travel destination because of these developments. In any case, the boom recently ebbed: the number of overnight stays was 29.4 million in 2025 - a decrease of 3.8 percent. For comparison: in the record year 2019 the number was around 34 million.
Complaining is a popular sport in Berlin, but positive developments are also sometimes the talk of the town. Waiting times of weeks or even months at the citizens' offices to renew passports and ID cards are now a thing of the past. In May, the outgoing Governing Mayor Kai Wegner (CDU) announced that the citizens' offices had achieved the requirements of the "14-day goal" project for the first time. “Anyone who wants an appointment at the Citizens’ Office within 14 days will now get one.” In fact, it now usually happens on the same day.
Second example: dog poop. Berlin has long been notorious for the many remains on sidewalks and in parks. This has now improved significantly, although there are significantly more dogs. Many dog owners now collect their pets' feces according to regulations. A motivation perhaps: Anyone who fails to do so will face a warning fine of 55 euros or a fine of up to 350 euros.
The situation has also changed for the better at the legendary BER airport, which was the subject of much controversy throughout Germany. It recently landed in the top ten in the “World Consumer Airport Index” global ranking of the best smaller airports.
Even if there are no teachers and some classes are still full, a lot has also happened with school construction. According to the Senate, 41 new school buildings, 119 additional buildings and 76 new sports halls were built in ten years for seven billion euros - for around 62,000 additional school places. But there is still a lot to do: only at the start of the school year was there talk of a record number of almost 405,000 students. The GEW union says there can be no question of an all-clear. “A lack of staff is made up for by employees every day - with additional replacements, larger learning groups and extra work.”
Unlike in London or Paris, many people with normal and low incomes still live in Berlin's inner city districts. However, because of the influx from outside – both a lot of rich and a lot of poor people came – affordable housing is now hard to come by. There are also many holiday apartments that are outside the normal rental market. The result: Because moving is virtually unthinkable, many families of four live in a small space like they did 120 years ago: Even older children share a room, parents sleep in the loft bed under the blanket in the living room. Conversely, older people live in too many square meters but do not move due to a lack of small and affordable apartments.
There is a heated debate in the city as to how this situation can be addressed. The left and parts of the SPD are calling for the expropriation of large real estate companies. Around 270,000 apartments are to be transferred to public ownership in order to stop the “investor carousel”. The CDU counters that this will stifle housing construction.
Also a topic on many counters and kitchen tables: a development at the disused airport south of Kreuzberg, the Tempelhofer Feld. The Greens and the Left are against it in order to preserve what they see as a unique place for recreation and sport, which is also important as a cold air corridor to cool the metropolis. The CDU, on the other hand, believes that with “careful development on the edges” 50,000 people could get a new home while still leaving 200 hectares untouched in the middle.
In July, the strange situation arose that Kai Wegner, the only top politician known widely and nationally, had to drop out of the race for the post of governing mayor. The aftermath of the “Tennis Gate” affair during the big blackout in January had proven to be too stressful.
His successor as the CDU's top candidate - critics say: an emergency - was Finance Senator Stefan Evers, until now a second-tier politician. The top people of the other parties are not A-list celebrities in the city either. Sign of provincialization or simply normality? How the competition between unknowns affects the distribution of votes will become clear on Sunday evening.
Particularly exciting: Like New York and Paris, Berlin could now also be ruled by the socialists. According to surveys, the Left with its candidate Elif Eralp has a good chance of becoming the strongest force in the state parliament election.
