![Despite the wet and cold weather, the joy was great among Kaiserslautern's mayor Beate Kimmel and the ‘fathers’ of the bank from ACO Guss and RPTU. - © CITY OF KAISERSLAUTERN Despite the wet and cold weather, the joy was great among Kaiserslautern's mayor Beate Kimmel and the ‘fathers’ of the bank from ACO Guss and RPTU. - © CITY OF KAISERSLAUTERN](/storage/media_foundry/images/4949/conversions/01-full.jpg)
To mark its 125th anniversary, ACO Guss GmbH has donated 80 benches in an unusual design to the city of Kaiserslautern. The first of these have now been installed.
The first of the donated benches, which can also be used as bicycle stands, were unveiled at the St. Franziskus Gymnasium and Realschule in the presence of Kaiserslautern's mayor, Beate Kimmel. The bench was designed by RPTU student Benjamin Tirbach. He emerged as the winner of a competition organised by Prof. Dirk Bayer from the Department of Architecture at the RPTU (Rhineland-Palatinate Technical University of Kaiserslautern-Landau), in which a total of 63 students took part.
The bench model is therefore a unique creation from Kaiserslautern and consists of standardised light grey cast iron segments that can be arranged vertically next to each other in different numbers. This means that the individual benches can be perfectly adapted in length to the respective location. The spatial distance between the segments also means that the bench can easily be used as a bicycle stand. The design has now been protected. The remaining benches will now be cast one by one at the ACO foundry in Kaiserslautern.