SRF radio news broadcasts from Zurich starting in December

Currently, three studios are being installed in the already existing news and sports center of the Leutschenbach, as SRF Director Nathalie Wappler announced at a media conference on Thursday. In the future, radio news and SRF 4 News will also be broadcast from here.

Around 70 employees will be moved from Bern to Zurich for this purpose. Construction work is naturally more difficult because of Corona, said Wappler. So that those present would mix as little as possible, work would also be done at night.

The Zurich site is to become the "center for topicality and digital development. The editorial offices for background and analysis, including "Echo der Zeit," will remain in Bern.

"Technical complexity underestimated"

In this already existing news and sports center, however, little has gone according to plan so far. Actually, broadcasting from these new studios for television should have started as early as November 2019, but the technology is still not running as desired.

"The technical complexity of this project was underestimated at the beginning," Wappler admitted. The first broadcasts from this studio will now be possible "in the middle of the year at the earliest".

Start of construction for the "Radio Hall

SRF's second major construction project, the "Radio Hall," has now also got underway. Since the beginning of February, construction has been underway in Leutschenbach to replace the Brunnenhof radio studio in Zurich.

The conversion of a hall for company vehicles into the "Radio Hall" is expected to take around a year, i.e. until February 2022, after which the editorial offices of Radio SRF 1, SRF 3, Virus and Musikwelle will gradually be relocated here until the end of August 2022.

The city of Zurich will subsequently rent the vacant Brunnenhof radio studio and set up a school building in it. (SDA)