Inner city extension Linz Mitte

Vertical garden city as a new use of the freight station site

A lively center is created through a mixture of uses and a wide range of offers for all interest groups.

In a sense, the vertical garden city consists of two cities on top of each other: based on Ludwig Hilberseimer's city scheme, the commercial city with trade, commerce, offices, sports and leisure facilities and parking garages is located in the base landscape, while the residential city is set up in slender volumes far above. Both levels are overlaid by the “axes of public interest”, in which social and cultural facilities are located at different levels. The resulting mix of uses provides everything necessary for life across all interest groups.

Light, air and sun for all residents must be given special consideration in high-density developments.

Slim slabs were chosen for the residential city in order to provide all apartments with light in two opposite directions and cross-ventilation. There are 2m deep buffer zones on both sides of the slabs, in which balconies, winter gardens or loggias can be added according to the residents' wishes or, if required, pergolas with semi-public vertical gardens.

New urban structures can be built on. They are, so to speak, a spatial plot of land, a vertical mass for further buildings, for implants, additions or superimpositions of other orders.

The fabric of the city, existing buildings as well as newly conceived structures, is treated as a three-dimensional building site. 5% of the volume of each large residential or office building is given to the public as a buildable volume. This buildable volume lies within the body of the building, but is external to it and separately accessible from the outside. The result is localised, fragmented structures that do not dictate the use of the building, but challenge the user. A high level in the city becomes accessible to the public as a ‘second-order urbanisation’.