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Paper short abstract:

This poster illustrates the challenges faced by hosts and guests of asylum accommodations in former tourism establishments and the fact that there are no legally determined minimum spatial standards for the accommodation of asylum seekers in Austria using the case study of Gasthaus Lazarus in Horitschon.

Paper long abstract:

This poster illustrates the challenges faced by hosts and guests of asylum accommodations in former tourism establishments and the fact that there are no legally determined minimum spatial standards for the accommodation of asylum seekers in Austria.

The illustrated example of the local pub and former bed and breakfast "Gasthof Lazarus" in the village of Horitschon and in eight kilometers distance to the Hungarian border, is a typical case for the small-scale tourism infrastructure of Austria and the practice of incremental investment in the built structure of a guest business starting in the 1950s. The first asylum seekers moved into the former bed and breakfast in the 1980s after an unsuccessful attempt of hosting mass tourism.

The spatial product of the absurd numbers of additions to the existing building resulted in a series of rooms and corridors without daylight and with very limited usability. This spaces are mostly vacant and only temporarily used as storage space or discotheque and not accessible to asylum seekers. In contrast to the abundance of not usable spaces stand the confined sleeping rooms for asylum seekers and the absence of common spaces within the accommodation.

The spatial mappings have been produced in the framework of the teaching and research project Fluchtraum Österreich at the architecture faculty of the Vienna University of Technology. See www fluchtraum.at

Along this poster we submitted a paper that elaborates on the topics illustrated on the poster for the panel "Problematizing asylum seeker and refugee accommodation: dwelling, housing, shelving?".