Non-profit housing as an opportunity for inward spatial development?
Future perspectives of the current housing stock in Switzerland
Non-profit housing providers constitute important players in the Swiss housing market. With a housing stock of around 270,000 or 6 % of all dwellings, cooperatives offer the largest part of non-profit housing.
In 2015, a comprehensive analysis of the public housing inventory in Switzerland was conducted and its potential for a denser internal structure estimated. Starting point was placing public housing apartment buildings in an international context. In 2016, the findings of the nation-wide overview were strengthened based on various expert discussions and a concrete planning process for placing the public housing project 'Freistatt' within Thun's existing settlement was examined.
In a further step, any additional internal consolidation areas should be explored now using spatial concepts, test designs and expert interviews. The findings should be used for the further development of planning processes, to ensure the urban structure and the social and ecological quality of possible renewal measures and to motivate the mobilisation of any available areas with densification potential through a comparison of the interests of the participating parties.
In total, this project should create an overview of public housing construction in Switzerland and identify any possible opportunities in such a way that these settlement inventories can be further developed in a desirable manner.
This project was funded by the Swiss National Science Foundation (SNF).
Project duration
April 2015 - March 2018