Weyl conformal geometry may play a role in early cosmology where effective theory at short distances becomes conformal. Weyl conformal geometry also has a built-in geometric Stueckelberg mechanism: it is broken spontaneously to Riemannian geometry after a particular Weyl gauge transformation (of "gauge fixing") while Stueckelberg mechanism re-arranges the degrees of freedom, conserving their number (n df ). The Weyl gauge field (ω µ ) of local scale transformations acquires a mass after absorbing a compensator (dilaton), decouples, and Weyl connection becomes Riemannian. Mass generation has thus a dynamic origin, corresponding to a transition from Weyl to Riemannian geometry. We show that a "gauge fixing" symmetry transformation of the original Weyl's quadratic gravity action in its Weyl geometry formulation, immediately gives the Einstein-Proca action for the Weyl gauge field and a positive cosmological constant, plus matter action (if present). As a result, the Planck scale is an emergent scale, where Weyl gauge symmetry is spontaneously broken and Einstein action is the broken phase of Weyl action. This is in contrast to local scale invariant models (no gauging) where a negative kinetic term (ghost dilaton) remains present and n df is not conserved when this symmetry is broken. The mass of ω µ , setting the non-metricity scale, can be much smaller than M Planck , for ultraweak values of the coupling (q), with implications for phenomenology. If matter is present, a positive contribution to the Planck scale from a scalar field (φ 1 ) vev induces a negative (mass) 2 term for φ 1 and spontaneous breaking of the symmetry under which it is charged. These results are immediate when using a Weyl geometry formulation of an action instead of its Riemannian picture. Briefly, Weyl gauge symmetry is physically relevant and its role in high scale physics should be reconsidered. *