Start of construction in March

Student dormitory on Hallein’s largest site

The best building site in Hallein's Neustadt district: the REI site is located directly behind the historic tobacco factory on Salzburger Strasse.(Bild: JHK)

The site has been wasting away for six years. Now, more than just apartments are being built on 11,000 square meters of unused land. Due to the impending demise of the Kolpingheim in Hallein, student accommodation was also planned.

Finally some movement on the REI site! Six years after the sale of the Hallein Reisinger site to the private construction company Russegger and the non-profit cooperative Salzburg Wohnbau, excavators will soon be moving in: 167 apartments and 42 student rooms are to be built.

The hoped-for start of construction in March 2025 will be preceded by a tough struggle with the municipality over the proportion of subsidized apartments, commercial space and public play areas. The project is now ready.

It will be a mixed building of non-profit and private units. Salzburg Wohnbau will build 91 apartments on Salzburger Strasse, 49 of which will be owner-occupied and 42 subsidized rental apartments. The municipality will be awarded 27 of these.

According to building contractor Georg Russegger, there will also be a public playground. The buildings will be a maximum of eight storeys high - originally, an agreement had already been reached with the municipality for ten storeys, but the design advisory board put a stop to this height.

Student dormitory to replace the ailing Kolpingheim
In addition to the 91 Salzburg Wohnbau apartments, there are also 76 private apartments from Russegger's company. The most surprising innovation, however, is the planned additional student apartments with up to 95 beds. Developer Georg Russegger: "We planned this project in line with the HTL." However, it is now expanding independently. Some HTL students are currently housed in the Kolpinghaus.

The building site is finally coming to life. However, this also means more homework for the municipality.

Bürgermeister Alexander Stangassinger (SPÖ)

As the future of the Kolpinghaus is uncertain, the 42 student rooms have been incorporated into the new plans, according to Russegger. Whether these will also be available for tourists in the summer is still uncertain.

For Hallein's mayor Alexander Stangassinger (SPÖ), it is positive that the construction site is finally coming to life. Nonetheless, he adds: "The homework for the municipality is increasing again. The construction work means we have to press ahead with the expansion of the Burgfried secondary school, as there will be many families with children in the 177 apartments."

According to Stangassinger, the time pressure for the school extension is a "mammoth task" - especially in times of immensely overstretched municipal budgets.