Students and local politicians don't want to postpone IBB redevelopment

Why are no additional apartments being added to IBB? This question was submitted to the municipality and SSH during a council information meeting last Tuesday, January 30. To alleviate the room shortage in Utrecht, SSH would like to start renovating the IBB complex in 2025. In their plan, the existing homes, built in the 1960s, would be gradually demolished and then replaced by new ones. This would provide 700 additional rooms. Last summer, SSH announced that it would be postponing these plans until at least 2030 due to rising costs and friction with municipal plans.

Conflict of interest
SSH's plans do not correspond with those of the municipality, which aims to redevelop the entire surrounding area, known as Rubenskwartier. The area going from IBB to the Diakonessenhuis hospital will be transformed into a "mixed urban area" by 2028. In addition to renovating and developing new student housing at IBB and on the nearby Kwekerij site, the municipality wants Rubenskwartier to have a new sewer system, more greenery, new parking spaces and a collective heating supply.

SSH says this will make it more complicated to implement the renovation plans at IBB, according to a council letter from last July. SSH will have to take into account the interests of many more parties when organising communal facilities.

In addition, SSH indicates that the renovation plans are hampered by an unfavourable building climate, with rising interest rates and high construction costs. To build good sustainable homes in these circumstances, it is necessary to significantly increase the price of rooms in the student neighbourhood, which has always been affordable. SSH is now spending the money intended for the renovation on refurbishing IBB and other projects, such as making Tuindorp West Complex more sustainable.

Student Housing Action Plan
The postponement of construction plans at IBB was reason enough for eight political parties to organise a council meeting about the cancelled renovation plans. SSH and the municipality do not lack willingness and ambition, according to chairman Midas Urlings, from the student union Vidius, who was present at the meeting. However, the collaboration is stalling because each of the two parties has a different idea of how IBB should be renovated.

Ulrings sees the room shortage increasing and finds the decision to postpone the new construction disappointing. “The need to build new student rooms is very high.” He mentions last year's Student Housing Action Plan, in which the municipality set the goal of building at least 5,300 new student homes by 2030. With new homes at IBB also postponed, the forecast is that only 3,500 homes will be built before the deadline.

Social student houses
Cheap student rooms such as those at IBB are becoming increasingly rare. The vast majority of student housing built in recent years consists of independent homes. There aren't many options for recent graduates looking for a more traditional student house to develop themselves socially. SSH's construction plan could have changed that.

Just like the eight political parties that had put the subject on the agenda, Vidius hopes that the municipality and SSH will go back to the drawing board after the meeting. Even if they have different interests and ideas about the development of the student complex, Urlings wants them to take a step towards each other and make concessions. “Something must be done about the acute housing shortage,” he says. “Students don't have time to wait for area development plans or better market conditions."