Legality of flying in urban areas

[pangloss]

Sorry, my German is not very good.

I have read Luft(Vo) and asked a lawyer friend to take a look at it.

It seems to me that you can fly in urban areas if you:

• Have an electric UAV less than 5kg
• Maintain line-of-sight with the UAV
• Are not within 1.5km of commercial air traffic lanes
• Are not disturbing anyone
• Are not endangering anyone
• Do not publicly post recognizable images of people without their permission

Is there another law? My friend says that knowing his fellow countrymen, micro quads and small UAVs will be regulated, licensed and illegal soon. That the law hasn't caught up with technology. Right now you can buy a quadrotor with a 1080p camera at Conrad.

 

[kofferfisch]

You musn´t take shots for commercial purpose.In that case you have to get an official permission, called "Aufstiegsgenehmigung".

 

[Manfet]

• Are not within 1.5km of commercial air traffic lanes

That's wrong. It should be:

• Are not within 1.5km of an airport
• Are not in an area of controlled air space starting at the ground level

You can lookup the last point on ICAO Maps. Unfourtunately they are not cheap.
The DFS had one online but it seems they stopped the service.
They only alternative is now a file for Google Earth.

 

[Mayday]

You can generally say that the bigger airports have extended CTR's, if next to a city (Dusseldorf, Berlin, Cologne, Stuttgart, Hannover...). They not necessarily have to be round, most of them have squared like or even unsquared shape. In most cases model flying is illegal there, but often tolerated if performed in smaller groups (like in the Tempelhof area).
Second thing is that there are so many military or government buildings that you must not fly over and/or must not take pictures of. And surprisingly a lot of those areas and buildings are not recognized by the first look.
But if you cope with most of the (internationally speaking) golden rules and add the ones you described in post #1 you'll be safe in 99% of all cases.

Where do you plan to fly? Maybe we could help you out with charts or something else.

 

[pangloss]

I live in Frankfurt. I see people flying in the city.. Launching from the Main, or the Anlage Ring, I do it, not crazy like this guy:


But I am sure that as more people partake, it will become illegal, if it already isnt. Seems only kids are allowed to have this much fun.

 

[pangloss]

does luftvo have a height restriction?

 

[olex]

Flying in the Frankfurt city center is absolutely illegal, the CTR control zone of the airport stretches over most of the city starting at ground level. Not to mention it's absolutely irresponsible to fly hobby-grade equipment in a densely populated area like that.

 

[pangloss]

@olex, thanks for the info, can you show a map of this CTR zone? The airport is ~10km outside the city, and there are no flight paths over the city, which has numerous 200-300m obstructions. Does this mean that the people flying rc aircraft in the anlage ring and along the main are breaking the law?

 

[olex]

The best I can do is a screenshot of Google Earth with the control zones .kml loaded, that Manfet linked in his post above:



I'm not sure where the Anlagering is, but you can plainly see that most of the Main river is inside the control zone, and thus flying there without contacting and getting permission from the FRA Control is illegal.

 

[pangloss]

Thanks! Ostpark lies outside that. And it's large and open.