Zurich: Seebahn-Höfe one step further
The project, which is intended to create living space for 1,000 people, has the approval of the local council. Meanwhile, the Heritage Society is considering legal action.
The Zurich municipal council has approved the private design plan for Seebahn-Höfe by 100 votes in favor and 11 against. This represents an important political milestone. The two cooperatives ABZ and BEP can now move one step closer to creating new, affordable living space for around a thousand people, says ABZ President Nathanea Elte. The broad approval shows that parliament is aware of "how urgently we need more affordable housing and what an important contribution the Seebahn-Höfe project is making to this".
The design plan safeguards the qualities of the two residential developments, which were developed in a long-term process with the City of Zurich. It began with eight guiding principles for neighbourhood development, adopted in 2008. With the design plan, the ABZ and BEP undertake to rent out their apartments at cost for 100 years, to provide 20 percent of the living space as subsidized housing and to reduce the rent for the municipal kindergarten.
The long process leading up to the approval of the design plan was repeatedly delayed, which drove up the costs considerably. However, the cooperative members are still fully behind the project. The ABZ General Assembly clearly approved the supplementary credit 2024.
The BEP is waiting with its supplementary loan until the building permit has been granted, but is confident that its members will also accept the loan. "The project is contemporary and forward-looking," says BEP President Claudia Vontobel: "We would like to thank the municipal council for the confidence it has shown in the cooperatives with its decision."
The next step will be for the building cooperatives to submit planning applications, on the basis of which the city council will decide whether to approve the construction. But it will probably be a while before the excavators start work - partly because the Zurich Heritage Society is considering taking "legal action" against the project. According to Heimatschutz President Noth, an expert opinion from the EDK Federal Commission for the Preservation of Historical Monuments, which the Zurich City Council should have commissioned, is missing.
Meanwhile, as reported by the Tages-Anzeiger newspaper, the "Seebahnhöfe retten" ("Save the Seebahnhöfe") association - opponents based in the district - are considering holding a referendum. The critics' main point of criticism is that the workers' housing estates from the 1930s are historically valuable and therefore worth preserving. (bw)
