Municipality of Hochdorf buys and develops Südi site
The municipality of Hochdorf has purchased an 86,000 square metre site in order to develop it together with its population. Thanks to this participation process, those responsible gained a clear picture of the population's ideas.
At the end of August 2021, the management of the Hochdorf Group, known in the region as “Südi”, informed that it wanted to sell its 86,000 square metre site in Hochdorf. Shortly afterwards, the Hochdorf municipal council decided to participate in the bidding process.
The acquisition of the site by the municipality for over 60 million Swiss francs required, among other things, the approval of the Hochdorf electorate. With 87.6 percent of the votes in favour, the project met with great support.
Since the beginning of 2022, the municipality of Hochdorf has owned the land, which previously belonged to the Hochdorf Group and its pension fund. The Hochdorf Group has leased the site back until the end of 2025, with the option to extend it by one year. The municipality would like to use this time to plan the development of the site.
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The people of Hochdorf are to play a decisive role in this. The project began with a three-stage participation process. In a first step, qualitative focus discussions were held with interested parties until mid-September 2022. In a second step, the input from these discussions was discussed at a public participation event at the end of September 2022. In a third step, at the end of October 2022, the population was given the opportunity to evaluate and weight the inputs from the first two steps in an online survey and to further sharpen the emerging idea.
Thanks to the many responses, those responsible gained a clear picture of the ideas of the people of Hochdorf. A large majority wants a central meeting place with inviting squares and paths. A broad housing mix and attractive office and commercial space are important to them. Ecological measures should also be a central factor in further planning.
The findings and the vision derived from them were summarised in a report and presented to the population at the end of February 2023. They form the basis for the test planning due in summer 2023, where topics such as urban development, traffic planning or building density will be examined for the first time.
The municipality would like to complete the utilisation planning, including the revision of the zoning plan, for part of the site by the end of the leaseback contract at the end of 2025 or 2026.