Silo as Status symbol The new Gutmann pellet store is a striking highpoint on the road between Innsbruck and Hall in Tirol. Many people are familiar with the monumental reddish-brown mosaic depicting a powerfully built bull on the neighbouring building. For those travelling by train from Vienna this ensemble tells them that Innsbruck Train Station is only a short distance away. After the Second World War numerous grain stores of this kind were built throughout Austria. At that time, they were seen as symbols of prosperity and security of supplies. During the era of economic upswing Raiffeisen planted innumerable concrete towers in the landscape, in particular in the State of Lower Austria, which is regarded as the country's granary. The sliding shuttering method, which was widespread in the 1960s, was used to construct these storage towers that soared into the sky. Some of the silos are even taller than nearby church towers and on this account in some places they were dubbed "agriculture churches". In 1978 the Rauch company erected a 45-m-high grain store in Hall in Tirol. The grain was brought here to be kept in a dry and dark space until it was milled. When Austria joined the EU in 1995 the building no longer had a use, as subventions for the storage of grain were abolished. The Froschl construction company occasionally used the building to store gravel, but in recent years it had no function for most of the time. The complex, which is centrally located in Tyrol and stands directly beside the train line, was acquired by the Tyrolean energy company Gutmann to make Austria's largest pellet store, which has a storage volume of 10,000 tons.
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