DÜSSELDORF — The Bund der Steuerzahler unveiled its annual Black Book on Thursday by opening a full-scale, walk-through replica of every wasteful public building in North Rhine-Westphalia, built at a cost the association refuses to disclose but describes as «educational.»
The exhibition, erected on the banks of the Rhine, includes a functioning duplicate of the Cologne Opera House that runs on a perpetual construction schedule: crews tear down a wing each morning and rebuild it by dusk, while visitors pay €19 to watch. «We wanted taxpayers to feel the waste in their calves,» said a spokesman, standing beside a scale model of a courthouse that has been under renovation since 1998 and now contains a second, smaller courthouse inside it.
Guests who complete the full three-hour tour receive a commemorative hard hat and a voucher for one free public procurement contract, redeemable at any state ministry. The association reports that the replica city has already attracted more visitors than the actual projects it depicts, and that several mayors have requested their own wasteful buildings be added to the tour so their towns can benefit from the ticket revenue.
By next spring, organizers plan to expand the exhibition to include a working monorail that connects each over-budget site, running on a timetable that is revised every time a station is rebuilt. «The train never arrives on time,» the spokesman said. «That is the point.»