Commuter students and urban mobility: Residential location decisions and commuting practices in a German university city

In many university cities in Germany, higher education students significantly shape everyday life and urban mobility. Among them, commuter students (CS) – those who live outside the city – may disproportionately contribute to traffic and emissions. Given that housing in these cities is often more affordable than in overheated metropolitan markets, their decision to commute needs explanation. This paper fuses an innovative conceptual framework linking 1) motivations for studying, 2) individual housing considerations, and 3) socio-economic factors with empirical evidence from a mixed-method case study at Osnabrück University of Applied Sciences (OUAS) to address this pertinent issue. Qualitative interview data reveal how residential location and commuting practices are strongly shaped by a combination of key variables spanning all three analytical domains. Logistic regression analysis shows that becoming a CS primarily depends on students’ desire to maintain their established lifestyle, including proximity to family, friends, and hometown, as well as their household situation. In contrast, living in the university city is mainly driven by the wish for new social experiences. Income has a non-linear effect: both low- and high-income students are more likely to live outside the city. Rental costs, while relevant, are not the decisive factor for most students of OUAS when choosing where to live. With CS already making up a significant share of Osnabrück's total incoming commuters, the results offer new insights for future housing and mobility planning – and highlight emerging sustainability dilemmas. Potentially, findings reflect broader shifts in higher education, especially the changing roles of relocation and physical co-presence.