It is an old complaint in city politics that the federal government, as a large property owner in Munich, is not doing enough to build housing. But now there is movement in at least one place, far in the north of the city: The Federal Real Estate Agency (Bima), together with the city, wants to create additional building rights for up to 1,000 apartments on an area on Neuherbergstrasse and Rockefellerstrasse. They should go entirely to federal employees at a capped rental price, which is currently ten euros per square meter.
On Wednesday, the city council’s planning committee unanimously passed the planning decision that officially starts the development. However, it will still be years before the necessary new development plan is approved by the city council and the apartments can then be built and occupied.
The planning area is 19 hectares in size (almost half as much as Theresienwiese) and is located in the Milbertshofen-Am Hart district, south of Panzerwiese. To the east, towards Ingolstädter Straße, the planning area borders on a Bundeswehr site, which houses, among other things, the medical academy. To the southwest you can take a short bus ride to the Harthof subway station.
The project is about densification on a larger scale. There is already the “Munich-Nord” settlement there with several hundred apartments, which was previously used by the US Army. It consists of loosely spaced three-story buildings, surrounded by large above-ground parking spaces and lawns with a large population of trees.
The draft resolution from the planning department states that they want to renovate the existing buildings and “new and contemporary living space should be created around them through appropriate densification”. However, a lot of demolition and new construction could also be necessary if it turns out that the buildings constructed in the 1950s “cannot be meaningfully renovated or even expanded” for structural reasons. In this case, new buildings should, if possible, be built in the same places, perhaps with a slightly larger area, in order to protect existing green spaces and trees. In the planning goals, the city specifies a framework of 500 to 1,000 additional apartments.
Further details will now be developed in a “workshop process” with at least five architectural firms and then evaluated by a jury. A “robust urban development master plan” should be created as a basis for further planning, in which the expected increase in apartments should also be noted.
In the short city council debate, Christian Müller, parliamentary group leader of the SPD/Volt, emphasized that it was “important from our side that the target number of 1,000 apartments is achieved.” According to Müller’s assessment, there will be a lot of new construction because “the building structure is so old.”
He also said that they think it is “very good that the federal government is taking action itself and is not leaving housing construction to the municipality again.” The federal government left large former barracks areas such as today’s Prinz-Eugen-Park or Domagkpark (formerly Funkkaserne) to the city of Munich, which then had to develop the areas itself with its housing associations or pass it on to other developers.
Anna Hanusch (Greens) spoke out in favor of “preserving the existing buildings” if possible. In addition, the “protection of old trees is particularly important to us”. She also said it was exciting that there would be no “classic competition” between architectural firms, but rather a workshop process based more on collaboration.
Heike Kainz (CSU) referred to the desired mobility concept, which is now standard in new housing projects and with which the quota of one parking space per apartment, which is actually mandatory according to the parking space regulations, can be reduced. “In this area, public transport is not so well developed and is often overloaded,” said Kainz. “It’s different than in a city center location.” It doesn’t make sense to “create mobility concepts that don’t work on the outskirts of the city.” Indirectly, she advocated ensuring that enough parking spaces are built.