Vienna
The Renter’s Paradise?
Neighbourhood buildings in the Sonnwendviertel, e.g. GLEIS 21, einszueins architektur
Photo: Hertha Hurnaus
Everything is different in Vienna. The city has been growing rapidly for years and yet life has remained affordable. Ever since the period of Red Vienna, the city has employed instruments against land speculation and produced affordable apartments. In the 1920s, the municipal government assembled a vast reservoir of land reserves for a housing program, from which the city continues to benefit to this day.
The tight apartment plans were compensated by the communal facilities integrated into the housing projects: laundry rooms, swimming pools, libraries, sporting facilities, medical centers, clubrooms, and much more. Only around 4% of income had to be spent on rent. These generous superblocks were designed to be open to the city but they were also governed by a strict set of rules that applied to not only the housing element but also leisure, hygiene, culture, raising children, and political education. The city determined who should live where and how.
Large structures from the 1980s, Alterlaa, Harry Glück, 1985
Photo: Zara Pfeifer
THE END OF HOUSING
(AS A TYPOLOGY)?
Following the decades leading up to the fall of the Iron Curtain, during which the population of the city steadily fell, Vienna reemerged as one of Europe’s most dynamically growing cities. Thanks to the astute land management policies that it has pursued since the 1980s, the city still has enough land reserves to be able to build, provide, and operate affordable apartments in cooperation with building associations and cooperatives. Vienna is a city of tenants. Almost 80 per cent of the population lives in rental accommodation. With its 220,000 municipal apartments (which means that 500,000 people have indefinite rental contracts and are served by Europe’s largest public building management organization) and a further 200,000 subsidized homes, Vienna City Council makes a substantial contribution to this wide range of rental apartments. The huge growth in large sites means that house building has become city building. A previously shrinking city of monothematic housing estates has become a growing city of urban quarters. Buildings designated as “neighborhood centers,” whose additional functions benefit entire districts, challenge the once dominant pure housing block by creating new hybrid typologies.
of the 2 million Viennese live in rented accommodation.
Pioneers: Rooftop Sargfabrik, BKK-3 Architektur, 1996
Photo: Gili Merin
municipal apartments exist in Vienna.
CARING CITY
While guaranteeing that housing is affordable, this top-down process also has consequences. The program is heavily regulated, leaves very little room for experimentation, and makes it hard for residents to assume responsibility. They occupy the apartment placed at their disposal and do not need to worry about anything. This top-down process often generates apathy among residents and uniformity in the architecture. The system is open to community housing initiatives but the room for maneuver for normal subsidized housing is very small. As a result, the AGENCY FOR BETTER LIVING is investigating possible ways of expanding this system, with particular regard to our aging society, increasing poverty levels, and the tangible impact of climate change. What does Vienna’s housing need in order to strengthen the participation of civic society? How should the growing city deal with cultures, identities, and the frequent lack of solidarity? What would ensure that Vienna becomes a truly CARING CITY, in which not only the city looks after its residents but we all take care of the city and all the people who live in it?