Topping out ceremony for the student housing of tomorrow...

For many years, the Studierendenwerk Vorderpfalz has been working to create new living space for students. Not least to relieve the tense housing market in the city. Recently, the pressure has eased due to the declining number of students (from 8,708 in 2020 to 7,173 in 2024) and increased online teaching, but despite these effects, the proportion of students living in halls of residence in Landau is still only 8.6 percent, even with the new hall of residence and a total of 620 places in the city. In a state comparison, it is almost 10 percent, and nationwide, the goal of 15 percent is repeatedly mentioned by politicians.

ALDI SOUTH has already created living space for students in many cities by taking local requirements and needs into account when planning new construction projects or modernizing stores. “The combination with student housing works very well at many ALDI SOUTH locations. The large number of newly created apartments shows how great the demand is – and how well we fit together,” says Jan Riemann, Group Director Real Estate at ALDI SOUTH.

“In college towns with a strained housing market for students and in cities without suitable building sites, the addition of storeys to ALDI stores is a win-win situation for everyone involved: the university town of Landau, the student union, the students and the environment. Intelligent internal densification instead of sealing new surfaces,” explains Andreas Schülke, managing director of the student union, his motivation for the unusual partnership. “For us, this is and remains a pioneering lighthouse project for student living in the future.”

The project partners are achieving several positive effects with the construction project:

• No new areas had to be sealed for the construction of the dormitory.
• The dormitory is very centrally located in the city and close to the university.
• The city's desire for ‘internal densification’ has been fulfilled.
• Living above a modern discount store is an enormous gain in terms of living comfort and offers students short distances.
• The long-standing competition for affordable housing in Landau has been significantly defused.
• Improvement of the local supply quality
• Additional sales area enables contemporary presentation of popular product groups such as regional, seasonal, vegan and organic products.

The topping-out ceremony will take place at 4:00 p.m. hosted by the construction company Leonhart Weiss.

Afterwards, the following speakers will welcome you to the topping-out ceremony:
Christof Hake – Managing Director Real Estate at ALDI SÜD
Dominik Geißler – Lord Mayor of the City of Landau
Andreas Schülke – Managing Director of the Studierendenwerk Vorderpfalz