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For three years, the peace and quiet of Doris Rüggeberg’s cosy flat on the wooded hill in Salzburg has been disrupted by noise from an adjacent building site.

An automotive magnate, a Austrian-German automotive magnate, bought the historic mansion at number five as a second home in the year 2019 for about €9m. Ever since, he has been actively remodeling the property before he and his companion take up residence during the winter.

The eight-room villa, referred to locally as the Paschinger Villa, was home from 1919 to 1934 to the writer Stefan Zweig, who described it as “romantic and impractical”. Among its appealing features, he wrote, was that it was “inaccessible to cars” and could “only be accessed by ascending more than a hundred steps”.

“This peaceful setting has seemed distant in recent years.”

Rüggeberg, a therapist, says the construction activity has been so noisy that she has occasionally not been able to concentrate.

But trying as the past years have been, she worries it could be just the start. The owner last month secured permission from local officials for a plan to build an estimated €10m personal driveway from a municipal car park in the old town through the rugged limestone hill. The octogenarian's plan is that the half-kilometer route will lead to a subterranean garage next to the villa where he will be able to store multiple vehicles.

The businessman has spoken of how he likes to take his cars on morning drives on the sharp bends of the Großglockner, about 190 kilometers to the south. His initial plan had been for a personal lift to be built to take him up to his home. When that was denied, he submitted plans for the access route.

Even in Salzburg, which is used to the foibles of the wealthy elite who gather in the city every year for the renowned opera festival, and which appreciates the financial contribution these affluent visitors make, this is viewed by many as a step too far.

“The owner has done a lot for the local economy,” Rüggeberg said. “But in this case, the municipality has failed to negotiate properly. Everyone is equal but some are more equal than others.” At the very least, she said, she would have preferred the city to have insisted the road be available for emergency vehicles, waste disposal and other residents.

Porsche received preliminary approval in early 2024 from Salzburg’s former mayor, a member of the conservative political party, to dig out “the Autohöhle” (car cave). Soon after, the local government was assumed by a left-leaning coalition, a Social Democratic mayor and his Communist deputy amid concerns the rich were pricing ordinary Salzburgers out of their own city.

The new mayor, Bernhard Auinger, was employed by the company for over two decades and used to sit on the board of its parent company as a former labour representative. He has conceded “the optics could be better”, but has said he has limited control over a project he “took over”.

“No one will have to notice the passage or even be aware it’s there,” Auinger told Salzburg media. “If the tunnel is in keeping with the times and morally justifiable is for the public to decide.”

Ingeborg Haller, the head of the Greens on the city council, has spearheaded protests to the project and kept the topic in the public domain. “What has appalled people is that a private person is being allowed to excavate the hillside for his personal benefit,” she said.

She has also been critical of the forty-eight thousand euro payment the owner paid the council for approval to tunnel through land that is publicly owned. An independent expert commissioned by Auinger after the payment was questioned concluded Porsche had overpaid by several thousand euros.

Salzburg’s city planning committee, which approved the road in the start of September, said the project was in the common good because as long as Porsche’s cars were in the tunnel they would not be emitting exhaust fumes, taking up room or creating hazards.

This, say critics, is absurd. “These are wildly amusing arguments, on top of numerous other reasons we’ve heard, like the fact the parking lots already at the house are reportedly inadequate,” the deputy mayor said.

The local official implied the affair had “eroded public confidence in the legal system”, and reinforced the perception there was “one rule for the rich, a different one for everyone else”.

The proposed road has also led to some creative protest. A group of environmentalists, calling itself the Tunnel Protest Group, has hung banners from the Kapuzinerberg reading: “And Porsche said, let there be a hole.”

Regardless of the opposition, the undertaking, having gained the approval of the planning committee, is highly likely to proceed. A decision by regional authorities is considered a mere formality and construction is expected to begin soon.

In addition to any environmental or ethical issues raised by a billionaire’s plans to bore into a hill, there is an additional dimension that makes it particularly problematic for some. The villa was the writer's residence for a significant portion of his life, before the Jewish writer fled in the year 1934, fearing the effect the growth of extremism in the country would have on his safety after a politically motivated search on his home.

It was here that Zweig, a humanist and pacifist whose writings influenced the 2014 Wes Anderson film The Grand Budapest Hotel, entertained literati such as a Nobel laureate, James Joyce and the composer Richard Strauss. (Prior to his tenure, Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart’s sister, Nannerl, also gave piano lessons here.)

It jars with some locally and beyond that the city did not acquire the property from its former occupants and keep it as a memorial to the writer. Outside the villa, memorial plaques – or stumbling stones – honor Zweig, his wife, Friderike, and her children, all of whom resided at the location.

Instead, the house was purchased by Porsche, who, as noted, is “descendant of a Nazi officer … the grandson of Hitler’s best carmaker”. The founder, who founded the business, designed the Volkswagen Beetle for the German dictator.

A representative said: “Since this is personal, no comment will be made.”