Shortly before Easter, Hoyerswerda’s mayor Torsten Ruban-Zeh handed over a grant from the Sächsische Aufbaubank to ZooKultur’s managing director Arthur Kusber. The grant of around 972,000 euros comes from PMO funds, which originate from the assets of the parties and mass organizations of the former GDR. “We are very happy to hand over the grant. We worked hard on it for two years,” explained Torsten Ruban-Zeh. This is because the financial support, which will cover 90 percent of the total costs, will enable two important projects at the castle and the zoo to be put into practice: On the one hand, the water supply of the castle moat is to be secured in the long term via a connection to the horizontal filter well 8 Am Haag. Secondly, a stair tower designed in accordance with the preservation order will be added to the rear area of the castle. “This will allow us to optimize the routing in the castle,” says Arthur Kusber. In view of Corona and the fact that the zoo and castle will benefit from more visitors to the Lusatian Lakeland as a result of structural change, it will be advantageous to be able to direct guests via two staircases in the future. Construction of the stair tower is scheduled to start as early as the second half of April and is expected to be completed in October. For castle director Kerstin Noack, the extension is also of great importance in terms of securing fire protection as a second escape route: “This secures the raison d’être of the city museum in the castle.” The total cost of the extension is estimated at 611,000 euros.
The construction of the connection between the horizontal filter well and the castle moat is also to be started this year. A technical system is to be created via which water from the well can be freed from iron and fed to the castle moat. The costs for this project are calculated at 601,000 euros.
