IN EXCHANGE WITH THE WORLD
The Vienna Model and its exemplary function
Vienna’s housing sector is recognised as a success story all over the world. No other European city can boast a similar constancy of its social housing policy – a policy that was never abandoned, not even when the spirit of the era was dictated by neoliberalism and privatisation.
The City of Vienna is committed to municipal housing construction and, contrary to many other cities, has never considered selling off this municipal stock. The great number of subsidised dwellings exerts a price-dampening effect on the entire housing market of the Austrian capital. As a result, rents in Vienna are relatively moderate when compared to other metropolises. A wide range of affordable dwellings can still be taken for granted in Vienna.
As a consequence, several hundred international delegations and expert groups visited Vienna in recent years to learn more about Vienna’s housing policy and its effects. Representatives of the housing sector, e.g. from wohnfonds_wien, the Housing Research Division, IBA_Vienna or Wohnservice Wien, wohnpartner and Wiener Wohnen accompany these delegations and inform them about the various tools employed to achieve the “Vienna Model”.
For example, in 2019 a total of 28 countries deployed delegations to the Austrian capital to study the Viennese approach and derive novel ideas for their own country, city or project at the political or governmental level. While these delegations were composed of experts from many European countries, such as Hungary, Spain or Sweden, countries like the USA, Ecuador, South Korea and even Mongolia likewise deployed delegations as a response to Vienna’s housing policy.
The interest of these expert delegations is directed at a great variety of topics in the fields of housing construction, housing rehabilitation or affordable housing. Thematic focuses include e.g. social housing construction in Vienna, “Smarter Together”, energy efficiency, environmental protection and sustainability, all of which are addressed through a variety of events, lectures, panel discussions or interviews and complemented by visits to housing complexes or neighbourhoods.
Vienna’s pride in presenting its model of affordable housing is further boosted by the benefits derived from the exchange of ideas and opinions as well as from networking with relevant international enterprises and institutions, as their experiences and know-how are as useful for Vienna as Vienna’s are for them.
Above all, however, Vienna draws on the co-ordinated and fine-tuned approaches of many dynamic European metropolises within the EU to safeguard and further develop its housing model.
