Village airport district Schmidbreiten

The Schmidbreiten area is located directly next to Rümlang railway station and is considered one of the best-connected sites within the Zurich airport surroundings. Due to noise emissions caused by its immediate proximity to the arrival and departure flight paths, the area has remained undeveloped to date. With forthcoming changes to the regulatory framework—most notably the easing of noise regulations under the Environmental Protection Act (USG)—the project explores the type and extent of residential and employment development that may become feasible.

A compact station square, a generous park axis, a work promenade along Glattalstrasse, and a fine-grained network of residential and commercial lanes embed the future neighbourhood seamlessly into its context. The Waldrapppark, together with additional neighbourhood and work plazas, forms attractive, community-oriented meeting and recreational spaces. Through unconventional ideas and site-specific typologies, the proposal introduces a development that is both identity-forming and protected from aircraft noise. The “Rümlang Neighbourhood” adopts the scale of the existing quarters while simultaneously providing an urbanistically integrated approach to aircraft noise protection. Architecturally, a reinterpretation of the traditional stilt buildings is proposed, allowing the commercial district at the northern edge of the village to become an integral part of Rümlang.