Ground floor locations in major Swiss cities and medium-sized centers, but also in smaller communities, are increasingly leading a bleak existence – at least away from the coveted prime locations. According to real estate market experts, there has been a clear functional change in this type of land use not just since the Covid 19 pandemic. Where there used to be a restaurant, a café or a hairdresser, a butcher or an owner-managed fashion store, today there is a yawning emptiness in many places.
In the focus of science
Nicole Hartmann, research assistant at the Institute for Interior Design (IIA) at the Lucerne University of Applied Sciences and Arts (HSLU), is currently working on the possibilities of converting this very special type of building space. With her colleagues Markus Gmünder, Christoph Hanisch and Katharina Kleczka, she is currently looking at the “question of the conversion of the ground floor from the inside out” in her “PARTERRE” project. Hartmann says: "Ground floor zones are an important part of buildings, but also of the cityscape." However, restructuring processes in the industry and the growth of online trading have recently brought about a change in the function of the ground floor locations. Social and cultural shifts in values as well as legal framework conditions also played a role in the subject, according to Hartmann. The project team collected very specific practical examples in the Portuguese city of Porto, where, thanks to new ideas and innovations, city quarters could be revitalized with SMEs and start-ups. Or recently in the city of Lucerne, where currently pronounced vacancies and unused business and retail space are visible and omnipresent due to the lack of international tourists.
One solution: pop-up shops
The company founding pop-up shops by founder and managing director Chalid A. El Ashker is committed to precisely such vacancies. With his “online marketplace” he has free space in Baden, Brugg and Dietikon on offer. The internet platform of the start-up based in Zollikon brings providers of free retail and promotional space together with those interested in renting space for a limited period of time. Even the rental agreement and rent payments are processed online in pop-up shops. Target groups are landlords with vacant space on the one hand and new innovative brands, companies, designers or artists on the other hand who need space to display their products. “Regardless of the type of space – we optimize the letting process,” says El Ashker, whose business idea does not stop at the Swiss borders. He also lists international business spaces, for example in Germany, the UK or the USA, many of them on the ground floor of a building. For the start-up founder, his platform has several advantages: "We increase the availability of retail space and promote the local economy by supporting new, emerging and established companies." In Switzerland, pop-up shops are already working with customers such as SBB, Swiss Post, Migros, SPG Intercity and Wincasa.
Flexible office space close to where you live
But retail solutions are not the only option for vacant commercial space on the ground floor of Swiss municipalities and cities. This type of commercial space can, for example, be converted into office space depending on the requirements of the administration and depending on the definition of the urban zone. The Village Office company offers one of the new German “coworking space” concepts. It is aiming to create several hundred flexibly rentable coworking spaces throughout Switzerland. There are currently more than 80 federal “coworking spaces” from Village Office in the country – for example in Aarau, Bottighofen, Frauenfeld, Lucerne or in Laax, Nyon and Davos.
Conceived and founded as a cooperative, it wants to promote new forms of work and build up a whole network of “coworking spaces”. "In doing so, we are also creating bridges between communities, companies, property owners and coworkers," says Jenny Schäpper-Uster, who co-founded the new branch association Coworking Switzerland in 2015 and 2016 and village offices on the other. “Our vision is that by 2030 every person in Switzerland will reach the next 'coworking space' within 15 minutes. In this way, we relieve the traffic infrastructure, increase local added value and improve the quality of life with shorter commutes. "
«Revitalizing inner cities»
Interior designer Nicole Hartmann from HSLU brings into play another option for converting vacant ground floor areas in inner-city areas: living space. "Depending on the existing floor plans, room heights, window fronts and surface types, the focus should be on an actual revitalization of the inner cities," she said. This could then also mean making old towns attractive, liveable and worth living in again for new residents. In many places in Switzerland, people have been displaced in peripheral zones or in agglomerations because contemporary and modern floor plans may have been created in new neighborhoods. "A discussion about new mixed uses and the redefinition of public zones could initiate a new trend and revitalize many city centers and inner cities," Hartmann is convinced.
This is exactly what the current “PARTERRE” project aims to investigate. It is also about the question of how a change of use affects the quality of life and amenity of the city dwellers and how the interfaces between public city life and private living can be designed. "The project takes into account the entire structure of effects with the interests of the various actors and develops a sustainable and future-oriented conversion strategy for vacant ground floors," says Hartmann. We can already look forward to your project results.
The city of Baden – a positive example
Baden, the third largest municipality in the canton of Aargau with over 19,000 inhabitants, is one of the top 5 of Switzerland's 110 economic regions. Around 2500 companies are based here, including many international companies. Thanks to the connection to the local and long-distance transport networks and the distance of only around 20 kilometers to Zurich, the canton capital Aarau and the city of Waldshut-Tiengen in Germany, it is a regional economic center and also a popular place to live.
So it is not surprising that location promoter Thomas Lütolf can report a very low vacancy rate in the inner-city retail space: "Of 220 spaces, only three are currently empty." This means that the vacancy rate on the city's ground floor is lower than it has been in six years – despite the ongoing corona pandemic. A trend that he sees in the retail space is the increased use by gastronomy and food concepts. The retail stores also showed new concepts and tried-and-tested products: for example, Ohne.ch on Stadtturmstrasse 15 offers fair and sustainable food unpackaged. In addition, the Sprüngli confectionery chain, which is well-known and popular across national borders, was able to move into the Baden train station.
And when it comes to pop-up stores, too, Lütolf sees more opportunities than risks: "Pop-up shops are not unknown in Baden." In his opinion, this trend will hold up in the long term and whether the active art and cultural scene in the city will be able to quickly and easily use the areas that have become free. Only when it comes to rent levels does it show a slight downward trend. "But that in turn makes it interesting for other groups of providers in this usage segment," says Lütolf. (mr).
