Vienna International Centre

Geschichte

The Vienna International Centre is the campus and building complex hosting the United Nations Office at Vienna . It is colloquially also known as UNO City.OverviewThe VIC, designed by Austrian architect Johann Staber, was built between 1973 and 1979 just north of the river Danube. The initial idea of setting up an international organization in Vienna came from the Chancellor of Austria Dr. Bruno Kreisky.Six Y-shaped office towers surround a cylindrical conference building for a total floor area of 230,000 square metres. The highest tower stands 127 metres tall, enclosing 28 floors.About 5,000 people work at the VIC, which also offers catering and shopping facilities (see Commissary below) and a post office (postal code 1400 Wien). Two banks (Bank Austria, Bawag PSK and United Nations Federal Credit Union offices), travel agents and other commercial services have offices on the premises.The VIC is an extraterritorial area, exempt from the jurisdiction of local law.Complementing the early 2000s asbestos removal works in the VIC, a new conference building, previously designated “C2”, now termed “M Building”, was constructed over the existing parking deck near the southern perimeter of the campus, and put into service in 2009.The M building hosted all conferences during the renovation of the C building (previously the main conference facility) from 2009-2013. Both M and C buildings are now being used for meetings. Very large conferences can be accommodated in the neighbouring Austria Center Vienna (ACV), a separate conference and exhibition centre with a capacity of 6,000, which is with the VIC campus part of the UNO-City. The ACV has an indoor link to the VIC buildings. It is guarded by United Nations security personnel, since the VIC has exterritorial status; the ACV does not.