— urbantick

Housing is one of the fundamental aspects of the city. A place for living and a good place at that. Not always, however, is it successful with too often conflicting interests clashing over its delivery. Economic aspects, but also politics and power struggles more often than not cloud the bright future of a generation.

Vienna has however, over the past almost 100 years, delivered on a social housing program that certainly is part of the reason Vienna is consistently rated most liveable city in the world. Jovis Publishers has recently published the 2nd edition of The Vienna Model: Housing for the Twenty-First-Century City a publication¹ and a touring exhibition to honour, present and discuss housing more broadly.

The housing model in Vienna is an interesting mix with a strong tendency to subsidised and state owned properties. Today about 62% of all households are
subsidised with the city owning about 220’000 housing units, corresponding to about 1/4th of the housing stock. About another quarter is owned by housing associations.
This Vienna Model developed from the 1920s when the city became one of the first to be governed by social democrats, labelled “Red Vienna”, decided that the housing market should not entirely be left to the private sector.
Today the instruments developed in this ongoing effort to provide a social housing program of very high quality are of much interest to planners around the world. The “four pillar model” sounds very cheesy, but actually has proven itself as simple enough to be implemented in practice and thorough at the same time to deliver the social mix in all residential areas. These four pillars are social sustainability, Architecture, ecology and cost. Detailed onfo on this in German can be found on the website of the Wonfonds_Wien.

Image taken from the publication / Vienna’s Four Pillar Model as presented in the 2017 Jovis Publication “The Vienna Model: Housing for the Twenty-First-Century City”.

Unlike other mainly European cities, Vienna has resisted the temptation to sell off its public housing stock to solve short term budget problems or regain control over an increasingly independent fraction of the population. Such efforts for example by the different governments in the UK were successful in this respect but at the same time destroyed the affordability of housing for generations.

Over the past 90 or so years a collection of housing projects have been realised in Vienna that are outstanding examples of their respective area and continue to serve as references to the discussions on housing international. The publication
dedicates a entire chapter to a number of the most prestigious projects starting with the Reumannhof 1926, includes the Karl-Marx-Hof 1930, the Werkbundsiedlung 1932 and the Wohnpark Alt-Erlaa 1985 amongst others. The contrast could not be any more stark.

Image taken from Wikipedia by Bwag / Karl-Marx-Hof central section of the 1km long housing block built in 1930.

Image taken from Faustian urGe Fist / Wohnpark Alt-Erlaa, 1985, Vienna, Austria. Architect Hary Glück, Requet & Reinthaler & Partner and Kurt Hlawenczka.

The publication showcases a whole range of projects. Some 60 prototypical project feature in the publication and the ongoing accompanying exhibition with the same name. It has since 2013 toured the globe with some upcoming dates for 2018: Warsaw, Poland, October 2018; Calgary, Canada (workshop only), November 2018; Conference Housing for All, Vienna, Austria, 05.12.2018; Los Angeles, USA, spring 2019. Details on their website.

The publication is based on the traveling exhibition with the same name. It was presented in New York, hence the dedicated chapter to the comparison of NY and Vienna. What the publication really is about is “Red Vienna”‘s housing projects legacy with an added explanation about the tools used to achieve this. Yes, it is a good idea to look closely at the “Four Pillar Model” if you have a minute.

Image taken from Jovis / Book Cover – The Vienna Model: Housing for the Twenty-First-Century City.]