City of Zurich criticizes the federal government for “a load of building regulations”
Published: Wednesday, Jun 26th 2024, 17:00
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The Zurich City Council sounded the alarm on Wednesday: there is an absolute building blockade looming in the city. The federal government and its overloaded regulations on the protection of the cityscape are to blame. The Heritage Society thinks everything is half as bad.
"The federal government has definitely overloaded the cart," SP city councillor André Odermatt told the media. "The consequences are serious. We are blocked in many construction projects."
Odermatt is concerned about the ISOS, the "Federal Inventory of Swiss Sites of National Importance", which has been in force in its current form since 2016. In Zurich, however, this set of rules applies not only to the old town or the core zone, but to 75 percent of the area.
The ISOS regulations are also constantly being expanded, criticized Odermatt. ISOS is increasingly becoming "the gateway for appeals". This has an impact on the housing shortage in Zurich because it also blocks cooperative projects.
Housing construction at a standstill
In Schwamendingen, for example, planning for 1,200 apartments is at a standstill because the associated bridge would lead over a culverted stream. According to ISOS, this could affect the groundwater. "You have to come up with that first," said city councillor Filippo Leutenegger (FDP).
Another example is the Brunau-Park estate, which is not actually a protected ISOS area. "But the neighboring area is an ISOS zone. That's why the regulations now also apply to this area," Leutenegger continued. In practice, the ISOS areas are constantly being expanded. In the city of Zurich, 1,200 small areas are already protected and "therefore blocked", said Leutenegger.
The City Council is therefore calling on the federal government to "immediately revise" the ISOS guidelines. This would require amendments at ordinance and legislative level. In the meantime, transitional regulations are needed to remedy the "untenable situation".
From now on, the city will also send all planning applications to the canton of Zurich for a preliminary review. This is to prevent it from being accused of formal errors later on. It is clear that this intermediate step has an impact on the processing time.
The Swiss Heritage Society finds the alarmism of the Zurich City Council exaggerated. "This is a storm in a teacup," said President Martin Killias on the sidelines of the media conference. The particularly strict "ISOS A" class regulations would only apply to around three percent of buildings. Moreover, the rules could already be taken into account at the start of planning.
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