Dresden was trapped in a Catch-22. In 2006, the traffic-clogged city announced plans to build a 635-meter-long (2,100-foot) suspension bridge across the Elbe River. But UNESCO (whc.unesco.org) warned that if a bridge went up, they would yank the World Heritage seal of approval they had granted to the Elbetal (Elbe Valley) in 2004. The United Nations body insisted that a new bridge would so greatly mar the bucolic, 18-kilometer-long (11-mile) stretch of river valley made famous by the Italian artist Canaletto that it would lose its cultural value. Despite repeated attempts to design and re-design the bridge to make UNESCO (which would have made do with a massively expensive underground tunnel) happy, city planners gave  their World Heritage crown as promised.

Established in the 1970s, UNESCO’s purpose is to protect landmarks and landscapes around the world that have universal worth and should, therefore, be conserved for future generations. German is currently home to the world’s highest number of UNESCO sights–32. These sights include specific landmarks, such as churches, castles, palaces, and monasteries, historic centers,gardens and landscapes, and industrial sights. For a complete list of Welterbstätten in Germany, visit Germany’s World Heritage website (www.unesco-welterbe.de).

In order to win World Heritage status, officials in the city or town where a sight is located must prove to UNESCO’s panel of discerning experts that it deserves a place on the list. The cost of the research, paperwork and politics that goes into this five-step application process is high. Regensburg started the application process for its Altstadtensemble (historic center ensemble) in 1989 and didn’t win approval until 2007. Visit the Regensburg World Heritage website and click on “Chronology of the World Heritage Application” to see what it takes to apply. UNESCO’s website also provides an overview of the application process.

Trends in selection change depending on the committee’s priorities. In Germany, sights with industrial themes and those located in eastern Germany are the most favorable candidates right now. In contrast, medieval and baroque Altstädte (historic centers) in the western half of the country have a hard time making it onto the list. Heidelberg, for example, has tried for years to win UNESCO status for its ruined Schloss (palace) complex. Though the city has made it on to a “tentative” list, the very first step in the application process, they have yet to receive full World Heritage status. In general, Germany has been popular with UNESCO since reunification. The numbers tell the story: 23 of the country’s 32 World Heritage sights were granted in 1990 and later; 10 have been added to the list since 2000. Of the 21 granted since reunification in 1990, 10 are in eastern Germany and three are former industrial sights.

Once a city or landmark is granted UNESCO protection, it enters into a “be careful what you wish for” situation: in exchange for wearing the United Nations seal of approval, a city must follow strict preservation guidelines and undergo regular reviews by the committee. As the Dresden bridge controversy demonstrates, UNESCO even has a say in a city’s major construction projects. Tourist dollars are a sure thing when you have World Heritage status. But the distinction also comes with the pressure to stay out of the UNESCO dog house. Every move a city makes – from opening up a new shopping mall to launching a festival or special even – has to keep the constraints and dictates of the city’s World Heritage status in mind. Before it lost its World Heritage status, Dresden’s bridge project earned the Elbetal a position on the body’s dreaded list of endangered sights, which also includes sights in war torn countries like Afghanistan, the Congo, and Iraq.

Dresden finally concluded that traffic trumps World Heritage. Luckily, the city is so beautiful, it still has plenty to attract tourists. Dresdeners can also be sure that this is not the first – won’t be the last – conflict in the highly controversial World Heritage universe.

Forget Disney. Hamelin is going goth. To mark the 725th anniversary of northern Germany’s most sordid unsolved mystery – the Pied Piper’s 13th century abduction of 130 Hamelin children – the petite riverside city near Hannover is throwing a year-long party that trumpets the legend’s sinister side. Instead of emphasizing the cheerful fairytale popularized by the Grimm Brothers, the 19th century story-telling duo behind Little Red Riding Hood, Snow White and Cinderella, Hamelin (Hameln in Germany) is paying tribute to the shiver-inducing real-life events that inspired the Piper legend.

“Maybe it comes across as risky to outsiders, who think of the Pied Piper as a fun character for kids, but he is actually a dark and mysterious figure,” said Michael Boyer, Hamelin’s official Pied Piper for the last 15 years. A native of Pennsylvania, but a long-time resident of Germany, he is the event’s orchestrator and MC.

Most know the Piper as the anti-hero of a bedtime story that teaches children two lessons: never skimp your bills and never follow strangers. According to this PG-rated yarn, the mayor of Hamelin hired a colorfully-clad, flute-playing stranger to exterminate its plague-infested rat population. When the mayor didn’t pay up, the vengeful Piper lured Hamelin’s children to a mountain outside of town, where they disappeared.

Historic (if somewhat shaky) evidence, including an inscription on a long-lost stained glass window and a first-hand account written in the 14th century, offers a rat-free take on the story that is more popular among rockers, goth musicians, and academics than kids. In this creepy version, the Piper is still a brightly-dressed stranger who took Hamelin’s children away, but to this day, no one knows where he took them – or why.

Charcoal posters, emblazoned with the silhouette of a dead rat, advertise the extensive line-up of anniversary festivities – parades, masked balls, and bat watching among them – injecting a note of medieval intrigue in this leafy idyll stocked with carved sandstone mansions and crooked half-timber cottages. Celebrations, which kicked off in March and last until December, culminate on the actual day of the deed, June 26, with the first ever re-enactment of the Piper’s flute-led procession. This time, 725 local children will follow Boyer through town and all the way to the base of the Koppenburg, the low, purple-hued mountain 10 miles east of the center where the original victims disappeared. The evening ends with a concert starring the “Pied Piper of rock,” Jethro Tull frontman Ian Anderson.

The rocker, who penned the band’s hit song “Piped Piper”, is one of many musicians to have embraced the mystique-shrouded flute-player. “There is a connection between the Piped Piper and followers of gothic music in particular,” Boyer said. “The Piper was an outsider who stood out in medieval times because of his colorful clothes; today, followers of goth stand out because they wear black.” The German heavy metal bagpipe band In Extremo – popular with Germany’s many goth followers – is the latest band to play musical tribute to the Piper.

This year, Hamelin is embracing this goth link by offering tours led by gloomy Pied Pipers – foils to the rainbow-clad original. In contrast to the costume – a rainbow affair complete with yellow booties curled up at the toes and a peasant feather cap – Boyer dons for tours, these nightmarish Pipers wear dark-hued get-ups designed by local fashion students especially for the anniversary celebrations. Ironically, Boyer’s son Brian is suiting up to play one of the goth Pipers.

Tours conducted by these dreary Döppelgangers provide a scintillating taste of the rumors–still swirling–about the fate of the Piper’s posse. Did they perish in a cultish ritual? Were they taken away because their impoverished parents couldn’t afford them? Were they forced to march to northern Germany or even Eastern Europe to establish settlements?

Residents of the Transylvanian city Ramov claim that Piper and company showed up on its main square and the group proceeded to establish German-speaking colonies throughout present-day Romania. Piper scholar Radu Florescu suggests that descendants of these misplaced Hamelin children were eventually massacred by the bloody Transylvanian ruler Lad the Impaler—the man who inspired the fictional character Count Dracula.

“I could spend hours and hours going through all of the theories about what happened,” said Boyer, who boasts an encyclopedic knowledge of Piper lore. He even has several theories of his own and is working on a screenplay about the tale. “I think Brad Pitt would make a great Piper,” he said.

One thing about the Piper myth is certain: rats were not involved. In the 16th century, German storyteller Christoph von Zimmern added the rodents, so closely associated with the Rättenfanger (Rat Catcher, as he is called in German), to the local legend. Jakob and Wilhelm Grimm, the British poet Robert Browning and the German scribe Goethe based their Piper-themed works on this less mysterious rat version, and it stuck.

Stroll along the city’s main drag, Oster Strasse, notable for its intricately carved Renaissance facades, and you’ll see that Hamelin has clearly embraced the rat tale. Easily outnumbering the dozens of frescoes, sculptures, paintings and shop signs depicting the colorful Piper are rats of all shapes and sizes—from a giant golden rat atop a footbridge, to dozens upon dozens of stuffed rats, to seemingly endless varieties of chocolate and gummy rats. Even restaurants integrate the critters into their décor; one eatery touts flambéed “rat tails” (pork strips) as its specialty.

It is hardly a wonder that Hamelin residents—who welcomed the first Pied Piper tourists 300 years ago–are suffering from Piper fatigue. “It’s natural that they’re bored with the legend after hearing about it all their lives,” Boyer said. He hopes that putting a darker spin on the story will re-spark interest in the legend.

“So far, they seem to love it.”