"Light air and sun" was the motto of the Lebensreform, a collective movement of alternative lifestyles that began in Germany in the late 19th century in step with the development of social democracy. Both movements were reactions to the living conditions in the rapidly growing cities. Urbanisation was increasingly perceived as a burden. The traffic on the streets, the exhaust fumes from the factories, the cramped living conditions in the tenements and the hitherto unknown haste, which made new illnesses such as neurasthenia acceptable, provoked counter-movements. Although Innsbruck was not comparable to Paris or London in terms of city size and the intensity of industrialisation, the fall from grace for many inhabitants of the former rural districts was enormous. The infrastructural problems were also similar.

Since 1869 the German quarterly for public health carewhich focussed on improving nutrition, hygiene and living space. In 1881, the Austrian Society for Healthcare was founded. Private associations organised educational events on clean and healthy living. There was political lobbying for the construction of parks in public spaces and the improvement of infrastructure such as baths, hospitals, sewage systems and water pipes. Assanation und Social hygiene were the slogans of a bourgeois elite concerned about their fellow human beings and public health. Like all elitist movements, the Lebensreform also took on some absurd forms, at least from the perspective of the time. Movements such as vegetarianism, naturism, garden cities, various esoteric movements and other alternative lifestyles, which have survived in one form or another to this day, emerged during this period. 

The seemingly eccentric lifestyle that was possible for wealthy citizens in their villas in Saggen, Wilten and Pradl was usually denied to workers. Many tenement blocks were dreary and overcrowded biotopes with no infrastructure such as sports facilities or parks. It was the early social democrats who politically confronted the realities of workers' lives. Modern housing estates should be functional, comfortable, affordable and connected with green spaces. These views also prevailed in public authorities. Albert Gruber, professor at the Innsbruck trade schoolwrote in 1907:

„I've often heard people say that we in Innsbruck don't need plants, that nature gives us everything, but that's not true. What could be nicer than when working people can walk from their place of work to their home through a series of plants. It turns the journey to and from work into a relaxing walk. Incidentally, there are many reasons why planting trees and gardens in urban areas is beneficial. I do not want to emphasise the interaction between people and plants, which is probably well known. In another way, plants improve the air we breathe by reducing dust.“

Even before the First World War, there were changes in everyday politics. Social democracy as a political movement had officially existed as a political party since 1889, but under the Habsburg monarchy it only had very limited opportunities to organise. The labour movement was particularly important as a social counterweight to the Catholic structures that dominated everything in Tyrol. In 1865, the first Tyrolean Labour education association. Workers should become aware of their position within society before the impending world revolution. For this, it was essential to have a minimum level of education and to be able to read and write. 10 years later, Franz Reisch founded the General Workers' Association in Innsbruck. Another two years later, the "Allgemeine Arbeiter-, Kranken-, und Invaliden-Casse" (General Workers', Sickness and Invalids' Fund) was launched throughout the country. Despite state repression, there were always considerable gatherings of the Radicals. From 1893, the social democratic Volkszeitung was published in Innsbruck as a counter-voice to the Catholic papers.

In 1899, the Erste Tiroler Arbeiter-Bäckerei, or ETAB for short, was opened in what is now Maximilianstraße. The co-operative set itself the goal of producing high-quality bread at fair prices under good working and hygiene conditions. After several relocations, the ETAB ended up in Hallerstraße, where it produced fresh baked goods every day until 1999.

The first free elections within the Austro-Hungarian Monarchy to the Imperial Council for all male citizens in 1907 changed not only the political but also the social balance of power. Monarchy to the Imperial Council for all male citizens in 1907 changed not only the political but also the social balance of power. The Pofel now had a political say. Important laws such as restrictions on working hours and improvements in working conditions could now be demanded with greater vigour. Together with Upper Austria, the crown land of Tyrol had the longest working hours in the entire Danube Monarchy. Although the number of trade union members also increased, Tyrol was too rural outside of the small town centres to be able to exert any significant pressure.

At municipal level, the census electoral law, which had given Greater German liberal and conservative clerical politicians a free pass to power for decades, remained in place until after the war. Even after the first municipal council elections after 1918, the fulfilment of the resulting demands had to wait. The post-war coffers were only meagrely filled. The major infrastructure and housing projects in Innsbruck, such as the Tivoli, the municipal indoor swimming pool, the Pembaur, Mandelsberger and Schlachthof blocks, were not realised until the First Republic.

Josef Prachensky (1861 - 1931), the father of architect and urban planner Theodor Prachensky, was a well-known Innsbruck representative of the Lebensreform and social democracy. He grew up in German-speaking Bohemia, then part of the Austro-Hungarian Empire. As a trained book printer, he discovered the labour movement during his wanderings in Vienna during the book printers' strike. After marrying a Tyrolean woman, he settled in Innsbruck, where he worked as an editor for the social democratic Volkszeitung for Tyrol and Vorarlberg. Josef Prachensky supported the Arbeiter-Consum-Vereinwhich Tyrolean labourers' bakery and founded the catering business "Non-alcoholic" in Museumstraße, which aimed to improve general health in the spirit of the life reform movement and socialism. Friedrich Engels (1820 - 1895), the co-author of the Communist Manifesto, had already recognised schnapps and brandy as an evil of the working class in the first half of the 19th century. Socialism shared the goal of getting people away from alcohol with church organisations. The world revolution was no more feasible with addicts than a virtuous, God-pleasing life. Prachensky was involved in the founding of the Tyrolean Social Democratic Party in 1890 and, after the First World War, in the founding of the Tyrolean Republican Defence League RESCH, the left-wing counterpart to the right-wing Heimwehr organisations. A particular political concern of his was the restriction of the church on school teaching, which was still very important in the 19th and early 20th century, even in the actually liberal Innsbruck, which had to adhere to the national school regulations.

Life reform and the growing influence of social democracy also influenced art and architecture. People wanted to distance themselves from what Max Weber described as the Protestant ethic, industry, time clocks and, in general, rapid technological progress with all its effects on people and the social fabric. People as individuals, not their economic performance, should once again take centre stage. The culture of the old society, in which the nobility and clergy stood above the rest of society, was to be overcome. Art Nouveau in its playfulness was the artistic response of an eccentric and alternative section of the middle classes to this Back to the origin the turn of the century. In the housing of the First Republic, the architectural style of the Neuen Sachlichkeit the upper hand.