The event area in the city center was already closed to arriving visitors at 11:20 p.m. due to the high volume of people. The organizer said that the New Year’s Eve Trail is once again one of the largest New Year’s Eve celebrations in Europe.
There will be a special “encore” on New Year’s Day, the City of Vienna Marketing announced that night. The Vienna Philharmonic’s New Year’s Concert will be broadcast live from 11:15 a.m. from the Wiener Musikverein to the Stephansplatz and Wintermarkt stages at Riesenradplatz in the Prater.
80 hours of program at 8 venues
According to the City of Vienna Marketing, 80 hours of programming was offered at eight venues – from a Falco tribute show to waltz courses and a laser show. In addition to the square near the town hall and the Prater branch, the central stations this year are again the Freyung, the Am Hof square, the Graben, the Stephansplatz, the Kärntner Straße and the Neuer Markt.
According to the organizers, more than two dozen food stalls provided food and drink along the festive mile. The town hall square was part of the event again after a year’s break. The Ringstrasse was also closed in this area from 10 p.m.
The stage at Rathausplatz hosted one of the central program items, namely the tribute show “Falco – In Concert”. In sync with the artist’s performance recordings, Falco’s original band interprets many of his best-known numbers. Other artists were also there, such as Alkbottle frontman Roman Gregory, “Kabinenparty” rapper Skero and actor Johannes Krisch.
For the sake of people, animals and the environment: No fireworks at midnight
One item on the program was missing again, and intentionally so: the fireworks. For the sake of people, animals and the environment, this will be avoided, said the City of Vienna Marketing. Instead of large pyrotechnic displays, there will be an eight-minute laser show on Rathausplatz to the sounds of the Danube Waltz.
While hundreds of thousands of people celebrated the New Year in Vienna, the police were once again out in the city with a large contingent. The officers will be deployed in uniform with special equipment and long weapons as well as in civilian clothes, the press office announced on Friday. The police also carry out search checks on the New Year’s Eve trail. In response to an APA inquiry shortly after 1 a.m., the Vienna police said that there had initially been no reports of any significant incidents on New Year’s Eve.
In addition to incidents in the home, numerous incidents occur, especially in public, due to, among other things, the use of pyrotechnic objects. In addition, there is still a generally increased risk in Austria this year due to a current threat assessment by the Office for the Protection of the Constitution and the continued increased terror alert level. Particular attention is therefore paid to the New Year’s Eve trail in Vienna’s city center.
