The guests are coming back – but the Bavarian youth hostels are complaining about an “investment and modernization backlog” after the corona restrictions. Despite direct state aid and generous regulations on short-time work, all investments had to be stopped immediately during the pandemic, the Bavarian youth hostel said. With the exception of construction projects in Furth im Wald and Munich, no measures to build, convert or modernize youth hostels have been implemented in the past three years.
Specifically, three major projects are actually pending. However, there is currently a lack of financial strength to implement it from our own funds and with the existing funding rate of 30 percent, said spokesman Marko Junghänel. “Berchtesgaden, Oberstdorf and Regensburg are on this list. At the moment, however, it is not foreseeable whether we can build to the desired extent – and whether that can happen in the foreseeable future.” In early summer 2023, the Presidium will deal with this question again.
At the same time, the youth hostels also lack staff: workers and specialists have migrated to other areas during the pandemic. This restricts the return to pre-corona status, said Klaus Umbach, President of the Bavarian State Association in the German Youth Hostel Association (DJH). “We can only slowly fill the personnel gaps.”
Youth hostels are different from commercial accommodation establishments, emphasized Winfried Nesensohn, executive director of the state association. They offer “answers to the important social, educational and socio-political questions of our time” and take care of the topics of sustainability, inclusion and education.
In 2022, Bavaria’s youth hostels counted slightly more than one million overnight stays. In 2019, the year before Corona, there were more than 1.25 million. The youth hostel association operates 52 houses in Bavaria.
Youth hostels in Bavaria
