Rotes Wien, social housing provision on a grand scale (1923-1934)

The Great War ended in 1918. With it the Austrian-Hungarian dual monarchy also ceased to exist. This lead to the independent development of many nations in central Europe. Austria became a republic as the monarchy was denounced on November 12 1918. At the following elections in which all citizens of legal age had a right to vote and the Social Democratic Party gained an absolute majority in the capital Vienna. Jakob Reumann was elected the first social democratic mayor. He was succeeded by Karl Seitz in 1923. Until the forced  Anschluss with Nazi-Germany in 1938 Vienna was nicknamed Rotes Wien (Red Vienna).

The collapse of the Austrian Empire created hyperinflation an poverty, triggered a refugee crisis (German-speaking people from Hungary, Galicia, Romania and Moravia fled their homeland) and left the large capital city at the head of a much smaller country. Vienna was also no longer located central in the empire, but right on the edge of the new Republic of German-Austria.

Vienna however was also a city of creative minds and intellectuals. The changed situation also incited optimism and a sense of new possibilities for modernisation. The social democratic politicians and the affiliated unions pushed for a radical agenda of (local) government-lead intervention and provision for all residents and the less well-off in particular. Creating public housing projects became the main concern of the Social Democrats in Vienna. For this they made use of the Imperial Tenant Protection Act (Mieterschutzgesetz) passed in 1917 that froze the rent of flats at the level of 1914. This made new private housing development unprofitable. As a result no new housing was planned, although the demand for affordable flats grew extremely high. The 1919 Housing Requirement Act kick-started extensive public housing planning by the city administration. This was supported by the decision to create the capital Vienna as a separate province in 1921. The prices for land and the cost of labour and materials were low as a result of the complete standstill in construction. House building started in earnest in 1923 with the first complexes of affordable Most housing was completed after 1925 when the strong new Schilling currency replaced the devalued Krone.

All these things contributed to Vienna become a socialist laboratory for social reform and public housing provision. As such this short period in Austrian history has attracted much attention in the past, and is arguably still relevant when viewing the problems with housing provision in the Western World. The social housing, that took the shape of blocks of flats with  few types of standardised flats typically built around a communal garden, was designed and developed by the Viennese city administration. The program was funded by the Viennese Housing Tax (40%), federal funds and a Luxury Tax. No money was borrowed to make house building possible. Using public money meant that rents could be kept very low. For the low-paid rents was set at only 4% of their household income. In contrast in privately rented accommodation over 30% of household income could be spent on rent. Furthermore if tenants become ill or unemployed rent could be waved or payment could be postponed.

In total the local government constructed 400 housing complexes with some 64.000 units (nearly always flats, but some terraces were also realised) and several amenities like a bathhouse, laundry, schools, community rooms, shops, playgrounds, maternity care, doctors surgery, etcetera. With over 10% of the population of Vienna living in these Gemeindebauten (Communal Houses) the true scale of the program becomes evident. The improvements in public health were enormous. So too were advances the in level of schooling and workers productivity. The number of people designated destitute fell dramatically.

The building campaign also become divisive as an expression of the political agenda of the left that contrasted sharply with the conservative mindset of surrounding rural Austria. During the civil war of February 1934, “Red Vienna” came to a sudden, tragic end, as the socialists’ enemies fired on the Karl-Marx-Hof -one of the emblematic projects- and drove the party and its leader’s underground, often into exile. Vienna's communal housing remain both as a symbol and a strategy. In effect these bastion-like mega-blocks stood isolated in a bourgeois city that longed for times gone by and were only occupied by people who supported their construction. They function still however as affordable housing and are managed by the city's authorities. As such they are more than expressions of municipal socialism, but a possible pragmatic example of solving a large-scale housing crisis. The workman's utopia was never realised in Vienna, but the city was reshaped to include people of all incomes in a comfortable and economic way. So let's not focus on the socialist ideals underpinning this housing program but seek inspiration in the knowledge that it is possible to build affordable housing in large quantities without deferring the costs to later generations by massive third-party financing.

These Gartenhof complexes are located around the old city of Vienna as satellites. They combine the ideas of the garden city movement (so enthusiastically embraced by socialists and reformers alike) with the Mietskaserne en Mietshof. The result is the Gartenhof with amenities as seen in Austria, Germany, The Netherlands and even England. All the Gartenhof apartment complexes still exist in Vienna. Most are also aesthetically very pleasing. Tours are organised to some of the better known examples, amongst them the Carl Seitz Hof (or Gartenstadt Floridsdorf).