Porsche heir faces backlash over £8.5m private tunnel to Austrian villa
The heir to Porsche, the luxury car maker, has triggered a class war in the Austrian city of Salzburg after he announced plans to build an underground tunnel through a mountain to reach his stately home.
Salzburg council is set to rule on 81-year-old Wolfgang Porsche's right to dig a tunnel, reminiscent of a James Bond villain's lair, to reach his 17th-century villa and its vast garage.
The small city's former mayor approved the project in 2024, but its current, Left-leaning mayor has opposed the move.
It has led to a dispute between politicians and the public, who say Mr Porsche was granted swift permission for his €10 million (£8.5 million) project while city renovation projects have had to wait years.
In one recent act of protest to coincide with Easter, activists hosted a three-day theatre festival titled 'The Tunnel of Mr P – a grotesque piece in three acts'.
'We cannot afford the overly wealthy like Porsche anymore,' the group says. 'No luxury for the few at the cost of others.'
The upset in the baroque city, where Mozart was born and the Sound of Music was filmed, follows Mr Porsche's purchase of the villa for $9 million in 2020.
The home was famously that of the celebrated Jewish author Stefan Zweig, who used it to entertain his eminent contemporaries, including James Joyce and Thomas Mann.
Zweig loved his 'charming and impractical' home, as he called it, so much that he wanted it to be 'inaccessible by car'.
Mr Porsche, who is chairman of the car company, appears not to share this sentiment. Last year, he paid the then conservative-led council €35,000 for planning permission.
Opponents of the project say the sum he paid was too low, while others reject it on the grounds it appears to give privileged access to the wealthy.
One banner left behind by activists on the Kapuzinerberg mountain, had a reference to the opening passages of the bible: 'and Porsche said, let there be a hole'.
Ingeborg Haller, leader of the Green Party group on the town council and an opponent of the plans, told the Wall Street Journal: 'I think what amazes people is that a private individual can dig into the mountain.'
'We reject special treatment for the super rich,' she said.
The Social Democrats will make up the deciding vote on a council, which is divided on the issue after the Austrian communist party won a record result in last year's elections. To make the politics more complicated, the mayor used to be on the labour board of Porsche holding company and may abstain from voting to avoid a possible conflict of interest.
To keep the peace, Porsche has suggested partially opening his villa to the public as well as allowing wealthy neighbours in the villa-quarter to use his tunnel.
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