Contribution of Spatial Planning to Affordable Housing in Austria
INTRODUCTION:
Developing the affordable housing stock is an ongoing political and social challenge with great relevance for ensuring equal living conditions and social peace. With the aim of providing a certain share of low priced dwellings, planning authorities seek to mobilize suitable plots of land and support developers with subsidies. These mechanisms are complex and therefore the coordinating board for planning in Austria, the Austrian Conference on Spatial Planning, started a so called ‘partnership’ by bringing relevant stakeholders together to evaluate the actual contribution of spatial planning to affordable housing. As a result, recommendations were formulated that now serve as policy guideline for the further development of planning instruments towards a flexible and demand orientated Affordable Housing production. The paper sums up the stakeholder discussion and depicts the current challenges and potentials spatial planning faces in Austria. Thereby, the paper contributes to the international discussion of developing planning instruments and approaches.
AFFORDABLE HOUSING IN A PLANNING PERSPECTIVE:
The production of a building stock holding affordable dwellings for people with low income or in difficult social situations represents a continuous and challenging state assignment. The political approaches and regulatory frameworks differ widely among countries and spatial planning has therefore a variable importance for Affordable Housing. Nevertheless, the provision of adequate housing gets discussed from international to local level and experiences large media interest. In 2016, the HABATIAT III conference in Quito, Chile reinvigorated the global commitment to a sustainable urbanization and set the focus to the implementation of the ‘New Urban Agenda’.
EVALUATING SPATIAL PLANNING IN HOUSING PRODUCTION:
The carried-out evaluation of the contribution spatial planning has on Affordable Housing and which measures could be taken in the near future, is based firstly on the mentioned studies and secondly on the contributions of stakeholders in the discussion. The eventual recommendations were adopted consensually by the members of the ‘Austrian Conference on Spatial Planning’. It needs to be mentioned that therefore the described outcomes are not based on a holistic scientific analysis but rather based on a political discourse and decision making process.
PUBLIC AUTHORITIES IN AFFORDABLE HOUSING PRODUCTION:
The federal state regulates the tenancy act as well as the condominium act and has therein certain possibilities to steer market prices for renting and selling dwellings. For example, there is a fixed maximum rent in large parts of the building stock deriving from before 1945. Public Housing is also settled at federal state level and targets less well-off population groups, while housing subsidies are a responsibility in regulation and execution of the single provinces. The planning and building laws are passed by the provincial parliaments, but the actual execution of land use planning and the issuing of building permits is set on municipal level.
FIELDS OF ACTION TOWARDS AFFORDABLE HOUSING IN SPATIAL PLANING:
The mentioned partnership of authorities and stakeholders on Affordable Housing identified urgent fields of action in spatial planning to enhance a more effective and efficient provision of land for housing production. One essential outcome of the ‘partnership process’ is a set of recommendations based on the analysis of the status quo of planning in combination with an expert assessment and listing of the measures at a glance as follows.
(1) Affordable Housing needs to be established as a goal in spatial planning law.
(2) Affordable Housing needs to be perceived as a regional planning-responsibility.
(3) Specific land use categories for Affordable Housing should be established, the experiences be shared and criteria be defined.
(4) Other planning instruments should support Affordable Housing by making appropriate densities possible.
(5) Evaluation and enhancement of the role of civil contracts to acquire land for Affordable Housing.
(6) Acquire suited undeveloped plots by a diverse set of instruments; limited dedication of building land; introduction of regulations for financial fees for infrastructure installation and maintenance; establishing the legal basis for land consolidation.
(7) Evaluation of the responsibility for public housing and adaptation for actual implementation. Complementary measures should be undertaken in the field of subsidies for Affordable Housing and tax incentives for owner to sell preferably to limited-profit developers should be taken into account.
CONCLUSION:
As the title of the article states, the contribution of planning to Affordable Housing is without doubt a big one. Real estate market logics and subsidies also have a crucial role in housing production, but are strongly linked to titles established by land use plans and planning restriction. The ‘partnership process’ and the formulated recommendations based on the ‘Austrian Spatial Development Programme 2011’ state clearly that there is already a wide variety of planning instruments but in many provinces the tool kit still needs to be expanded. The true benefit of the ‘partnership process’ was forming a communication platform, bringing different public authorities and stakeholders to a discussion table.