The Plane Tree at the Nebbiensches Gartenhaus
Seven metres and thirteen centimetres around the trunk, measured in October 2025. That is a plane tree you could not reach a tenth of the way around, standing in a strip of park a few minutes from Frankfurt's opera house. An independent big-tree survey recorded 713 centimetres last autumn; another surveyor measured 704 in 2022. Two measurements three years apart agreeing that closely is the kind of number worth trusting. It was planted in 1820, ten years after the neoclassical pavilion it stands behind, the Nebbiensches Gartenhaus. Both sit in the Bockenheimer Anlage, part of the ring of parkland Frankfurt laid out on the ground where its city walls had stood, which is why the green in this part of town runs in a curve instead of a grid. The tree is around 35 metres tall with a crown some 26 metres across, and it carries entry 028 on the city's register of natural monuments. Two centuries is not particularly old for a plane. It is old for this address, where a garden pavilion from 1810 now sits in sight of the banking towers. Access is free and unrestricted at any hour, which is worth saying because two of the protected trees on this list stand behind an admission desk. This one is simply in a public park, and you can put your hand on it.
The line is our estimate of how much there is to see, not a measurement. Typical for this species where this tree stands; exact weeks shift with the year.
Bockenheimer Anlage, behind the Nebbiensches Gartenhaus, InnenstadtYou can recognise it by its trunk, 7.13 metres round, standing directly behind the neoclassical Nebbiensches Gartenhaus. It stands in the Bockenheimer Anlage.
Free, public park (Bockenheimer Anlage), unrestricted access confirmed by an October 2025 independent tree survey
Alte Oper or Bockenheimer Warte U-Bahn stations, a few minutes walk through the Anlagenring park
Sources
Where the facts on this page come from.
- In the official register: Naturdenkmale der Stadt Frankfurt am Main (ND 028), no. ND 028
- flurbaum.de
- baumkunde.de
- de.wikipedia.org