The lecture describes how urban sprawl and high land consumption in Austria are increasingly pushing economic, social and cultural life out of town centres and into the periphery. The protection of town centres is therefore closely linked to soil protection and sustainable spatial planning: Only through binding upper limits on land consumption and targeted measures against soil sealing can town centres be revitalised and their central role in local supply, community and culture be strengthened. The lecture calls for a soil protection referendum to generate political pressure for progressive spatial planning and the protection of town centres.