It starts on Monday with the walls. They are delivered by truck as prefabricated concrete parts, erected, supported with posts and then grouted. The bathrooms follow on Wednesday: uniform sanitary cells with showers, toilets and all the trimmings, which are lifted into the designated places by a crane. The ceiling tiles, which are also prefabricated, will be added on Thursday and will be grouted on Friday. “And so we can create an entire floor within just one week,” says Richard Greß. “It’s basically just like building Lego.”
Richard Greß heads the Munich branch of the Goldbeck Süd company and is standing this afternoon at a construction site in the residential area known as the American settlement at Perlacher Forst in the Fasangarten district. His company, which specializes in serial construction based on the Lego principle, is currently building three buildings with a total of 62 rental apartments here on behalf of the Federal Real Estate Agency (Bima). The starting signal for the shell construction work was only given in April, the topping-out ceremony is now being celebrated, and the buildings, including the underground car park, should be ready for occupancy by next July.
Which brings you directly to the “big advantage” of serial construction, as Greß emphasizes. Namely “the immense time advantage”. It takes just 300 working days to put up the three buildings here on Minnewitstrasse. “We can easily complete the shell in half the time as with conventional construction,” emphasizes the branch manager. In addition, the serial construction method makes the project more economical, says project manager Christine Erhart. According to her, this approach is primarily suitable for rental apartments, as they are usually “all built the same and equipped the same way”. Ultimately, individuality has to take a back seat in serial construction. Bima’s 62 one- to three-room apartments are always built according to a similar pattern and all have the same finished bathrooms.
“This project is an example of how building can and should work today,” says Greß. “Systematized, fast and sustainable.” And Paul Johannes Fietz, board member at Bima, also emphasizes: “This is more than prefabricated construction 2.0.” Rather, his authority is applying its usual high standards to this project, for example in terms of sound insulation, accessibility and energy efficiency. As part of its housing offensive, Bima is relying on a serial construction method in many places, says Fietz.
In total, the authority is planning to build 8,000 apartments nationwide. Bima was founded 20 years ago as a “sales company” – with the aim of selling the majority of the federal government’s almost 60,000 apartments at the time. In fact, this number fell to 34,000 before a change in thinking took place. Bima now has a stock of 38,000 apartments and is planning to build more – as part of the housing offensive announced in 2018.
Many of the current residents in the American settlement are critical of Bima’s plans
One focus is on the American settlement, where hundreds of US soldiers stationed in Munich lived with their families between the 1950s and 1990s, and where up to 1,000 new apartments are to be built on the spacious green areas as part of densification. The Bima creates affordable living space, emphasizes Fietz, with a view to new building rents of ten euros per square meter. “And that’s a very good number, especially here in Munich.” According to Fietz, the low rents not only benefit federal employees, to whom the Bima apartments are first offered as part of the federal housing welfare program. Once their needs are met, the apartments come onto the open market – “under the same conditions,” says Fietz.
Nevertheless, many of the current residents in the American settlement are critical of Bima’s plans. They fear that these will destroy the style and character of their neighborhood. They also warn against “radical densification” with “oversized cubic residential castles,” as stated in a petition that more than 2,400 people have supported.
In any case, the project on Minnewitstrasse is not a blueprint for the rest of the American settlement, emphasizes Ilona Stangler from Bima’s portfolio management division in Munich. According to her, the planning is currently in a “waiting phase” due to the monument review. If, as the critics had hoped, this should result in the American settlement being placed under ensemble protection, then the entire planning would have to be reopened, says Stangler.
