Collonge-Bellerive
Encyclopedia
Collonge-Bellerive is a municipality
Municipalities of Switzerland
Communes , also known as municipalities, are the smallest government division in Switzerland, numbering 2,596 . While many have a population of a few hundred citizens, the largest cities such as Zürich or Geneva also have the legal status of municipalities...

 of the Canton of Geneva
Canton of Geneva
The Republic and Canton of Geneva is the French speaking westernmost canton or state of Switzerland, surrounded on almost all sides by France. As is the case in several other Swiss cantons The Republic and Canton of Geneva is the French speaking westernmost canton or state of Switzerland,...

, Switzerland
Switzerland
Switzerland name of one of the Swiss cantons. ; ; ; or ), in its full name the Swiss Confederation , is a federal republic consisting of 26 cantons, with Bern as the seat of the federal authorities. The country is situated in Western Europe,Or Central Europe depending on the definition....

.

History

Collonge-Bellerive is first mentioned in 1153 as Collonges. In 1275 it was mentioned as Sancto Mauricio. Until 1799 it was known as Collonge sur Bellerive. It became part of the Canton of Geneva in 1816.

Geography

Collonge-Bellerive has an area, , of 6.12 square kilometres (2.4 sq mi). Of this area, 2.27 km² (0.876451900005054 sq mi) or 37.1% is used for agricultural purposes, while 0.25 km² (0.0965255396481338 sq mi) or 4.1% is forested. Of the rest of the land, 3.58 km² (1.4 sq mi) or 58.5% is settled (buildings or roads), 0.01 km² (2.5 acre) or 0.2% is either rivers or lakes and 0.02 km² (4.9 acre) or 0.3% is unproductive land.

Of the built up area, industrial buildings made up 1.3% of the total area while housing and buildings made up 45.9% and transportation infrastructure made up 7.7%. while parks, green belts and sports fields made up 2.8%. Out of the forested land, 2.5% of the total land area is heavily forested and 1.6% is covered with orchards or small clusters of trees. Of the agricultural land, 21.4% is used for growing crops and 2.0% is pastures, while 13.7% is used for orchards or vine crops. All the water in the municipality is in lakes.

It is situated on the left bank of Lake Geneva
Lake Geneva
Lake Geneva or Lake Léman is a lake in Switzerland and France. It is one of the largest lakes in Western Europe. 59.53 % of it comes under the jurisdiction of Switzerland , and 40.47 % under France...

. Surrounded by the municipalities of Cologny
Cologny
Cologny is a municipality in the Canton of Geneva, Switzerland.-Geography:Cologny has an area, , of . Of this area, or 17.7% is used for agricultural purposes, while or 4.1% is forested...

, Vandœuvres
Vandœuvres
Vandœuvres is a municipality of the Canton of Geneva, Switzerland.-Geography:Vandoeuvres has an area, , of . Of this area, or 39.0% is used for agricultural purposes, while or 5.9% is forested. Of the rest of the land, or 55.1% is settled .Of the built up area, housing and buildings made up...

, Choulex
Choulex
Choulex is a municipality of the Canton of Geneva, Switzerland.-Geography:Choulex has an area, , of . Of this area, or 73.7% is used for agricultural purposes, while or 9.5% is forested...

, Meinier
Meinier
Meinier is a municipality of the Canton of Geneva, Switzerland.-History:Meinier is first mentioned in 1153 as de maniaco. Around 1344 it was mentioned as Meignier.-Geography:...

, and Corsier
Corsier
Corsier is a municipality of the Canton of Geneva, Switzerland.-History:Corsier is first mentioned in 1297 as Corsiacum. Between 1816-58 Corsier and Anières formed a single municipality.-Geography:...

, Collonge-Bellerive consists primarily of the villages of Collonge, Vésenaz and Saint-Maurice together with the hamlets
Hamlet (place)
A hamlet is usually a rural settlement which is too small to be considered a village, though sometimes the word is used for a different sort of community. Historically, when a hamlet became large enough to justify building a church, it was then classified as a village...

 of Cherre, Bellerive, La Repentance and La Capite.

The municipality of Collonge-Bellerive consists of the sub-sections or villages of Bellerive, Collonge, La Gabiule, Saint-Maurice, La Pallanterie, La Californie, Vésenaz - lac, Vésenaz - village and La Combe.

Demographics

Collonge-Bellerive has a population of . , 28.8% of the population are resident foreign nationals. Over the last 10 years (1999–2009 ) the population has changed at a rate of 23.9%. It has changed at a rate of 19% due to migration and at a rate of 4.4% due to births and deaths.

Most of the population speaks French
French language
French is a Romance language spoken as a first language in France, the Romandy region in Switzerland, Wallonia and Brussels in Belgium, Monaco, the regions of Quebec and Acadia in Canada, and by various communities elsewhere. Second-language speakers of French are distributed throughout many parts...

 (5,010 or 79.0%), with English
English language
English is a West Germanic language that arose in the Anglo-Saxon kingdoms of England and spread into what was to become south-east Scotland under the influence of the Anglian medieval kingdom of Northumbria...

 being second most common (431 or 6.8%) and German
German language
German is a West Germanic language, related to and classified alongside English and Dutch. With an estimated 90 – 98 million native speakers, German is one of the world's major languages and is the most widely-spoken first language in the European Union....

 being third (296 or 4.7%). There are 2 people who speak Romansh.

, the gender distribution of the population was 47.7% male and 52.3% female. The population was made up of 2,517 Swiss men (33.0% of the population) and 1,115 (14.6%) non-Swiss men. There were 2,876 Swiss women (37.8%) and 1,109 (14.6%) non-Swiss women. Of the population in the municipality 1,031 or about 16.3% were born in Collonge-Bellerive and lived there in 2000. There were 1,844 or 29.1% who were born in the same canton, while 908 or 14.3% were born somewhere else in Switzerland, and 2,249 or 35.5% were born outside of Switzerland.

In there were 40 live births to Swiss citizens and 29 births to non-Swiss citizens, and in same time span there were 30 deaths of Swiss citizens and 12 non-Swiss citizen deaths. Ignoring immigration and emigration, the population of Swiss citizens increased by 10 while the foreign population increased by 17. There were 5 Swiss men and 4 Swiss women who emigrated from Switzerland. At the same time, there were 27 non-Swiss men and 22 non-Swiss women who immigrated from another country to Switzerland. The total Swiss population change in 2008 (from all sources, including moves across municipal borders) was an increase of 70 and the non-Swiss population increased by 44 people. This represents a population growth rate of 1.5%.

The age distribution of the population is children and teenagers (0–19 years old) make up 26.8% of the population, while adults (20–64 years old) make up 58.7% and seniors (over 64 years old) make up 14.6%.

, there were 2,603 people who were single and never married in the municipality. There were 3,158 married individuals, 278 widows or widowers and 305 individuals who are divorced.

the average number of residents per living room was 0.53 which is less people per room than the cantonal average of 0.64 per room. In this case, a room is defined as space of a housing unit of at least 4 m² (43.1 sq ft) as normal bedrooms, dining rooms, living rooms, kitchens and habitable cellars and attics. About 62.6% of the total households were owner occupied, or in other words did not pay rent (though they may have a mortgage
Mortgage loan
A mortgage loan is a loan secured by real property through the use of a mortgage note which evidences the existence of the loan and the encumbrance of that realty through the granting of a mortgage which secures the loan...

 or a rent-to-own agreement).

, there were 2,247 private households in the municipality, and an average of 2.7 persons per household. There were 523 households that consist of only one person and 213 households with five or more people. Out of a total of 2,323 households that answered this question, 22.5% were households made up of just one person and there were 15 adults who lived with their parents. Of the rest of the households, there are 593 married couples without children, 922 married couples with children There were 158 single parents with a child or children. There were 36 households that were made up of unrelated people and 76 households that were made up of some sort of institution or another collective housing.

there were 1,364 single family homes (or 78.3% of the total) out of a total of 1,743 inhabited buildings. There were 187 multi-family buildings (10.7%), along with 138 multi-purpose buildings that were mostly used for housing (7.9%) and 54 other use buildings (commercial or industrial) that also had some housing (3.1%). Of the single family homes 130 were built before 1919, while 253 were built between 1990 and 2000. The greatest number of single family homes (282) were built between 1971 and 1980.

there were 2,455 apartments in the municipality. The most common apartment size was 4 rooms of which there were 491. There were 114 single room apartments and 1,259 apartments with five or more rooms. Of these apartments, a total of 2,123 apartments (86.5% of the total) were permanently occupied, while 259 apartments (10.5%) were seasonally occupied and 73 apartments (3.0%) were empty. , the construction rate of new housing units was 5.3 new units per 1000 residents. The vacancy rate for the municipality, , was 0.3%.

The historical population is given in the following chart:

Heritage sites of national significance

It is home to one or more prehistoric pile-dwelling
Stilt house
Stilt houses or pile dwellings or palafitte are houses raised on piles over the surface of the soil or a body of water. Stilt houses are built primarily as a protection against flooding, but also serve to keep out vermin...

 (or stilt house) settlements that are part of the Prehistoric Pile dwellings around the Alps
Prehistoric Pile dwellings around the Alps
Prehistoric Pile dwellings around the Alps is a series of prehistoric pile-dwelling settlements in and around the Alps built from around 5000 to 500 B.C. on the edges of lakes, rivers or wetlands...

 UNESCO
UNESCO
The United Nations Educational, Scientific and Cultural Organization is a specialized agency of the United Nations...

 World Heritage Site. The Bellerive I (a Bronze Age
Bronze Age
The Bronze Age is a period characterized by the use of copper and its alloy bronze as the chief hard materials in the manufacture of some implements and weapons. Chronologically, it stands between the Stone Age and Iron Age...

, littoral
Littoral
The littoral zone is that part of a sea, lake or river that is close to the shore. In coastal environments the littoral zone extends from the high water mark, which is rarely inundated, to shoreline areas that are permanently submerged. It always includes this intertidal zone and is often used to...

 archeological site), the Bellerive Castle
Bellerive Castle
Bellerive Castle is a castle in the municipality of Collonge-Bellerive of the Canton of Geneva in Switzerland. It is a Swiss heritage site of national significance.-References:...

 and Villa-chalet du Prince Essling are listed as Swiss heritage site of national significance
Swiss Inventory of Cultural Property of National and Regional Significance
The Swiss Inventory of Cultural Property of National and Regional Significance is a register of some 8,300 items of cultural property in Switzerland...

.

Politics

In the 2007 federal election
Swiss federal election, 2007
Elections to the Swiss Federal Assembly, the federal parliament of Switzerland, were held on Sunday, 21 October 2007. In a few cantons, a second round of the elections to the Council of States was held on 11 November, 18 November, and 25 November 2007...

 the most popular party was the LPS Party
Liberal Party of Switzerland
The Liberal Party of Switzerland was a party with economically liberal policies. It was known as a party of the upper class. On 1 January 2009 it merged with the larger Free Democratic Party to establish FDP.The Liberals....

 which received 30.08% of the vote. The next three most popular parties were the SVP
Swiss People's Party
The Swiss People's Party , also known as the Democratic Union of the Centre , is a conservative political party in Switzerland. Chaired by Toni Brunner, but spearheaded by Christoph Blocher, the party is the largest party in the Federal Assembly, with 58 members of the National Council and 6 of...

 (22.39%), the CVP
Christian Democratic People's Party of Switzerland
The Christian Democratic People's Party of Switzerland is a Christian democratic political party in Switzerland. It is the fourth-largest party in the National Council, with 31 seats, and the largest in the Council of States, with 15 seats. It has one seat, that of Doris Leuthard, on the Swiss...

 (14.55%) and the Green Party
Green Party of Switzerland
The Green Party of Switzerland is the fifth-largest party in the National Council of Switzerland, and the largest party that is not represented on the Federal Council.-History:...

 (10.15%). In the federal election, a total of 2,153 votes were cast, and the voter turnout
Voter turnout
Voter turnout is the percentage of eligible voters who cast a ballot in an election . After increasing for many decades, there has been a trend of decreasing voter turnout in most established democracies since the 1960s...

 was 55.2%.

In the 2009 Grand Conseil
Grand Council of Geneva
The Grand Council of Geneva is the legislature of the canton of Geneva, in Switzerland. Geneva, styled as a 'Republic and Canton', has a unicameral legislature. The Grand Council has 100 seats, with members elected every four years...

 election, there were a total of 4,053 registered voters of which 2,012 (49.6%) voted. The most popular party in the municipality for this election was the Libéral
FDP.The Liberals
FDP.The Liberals is a classical liberal political party in Switzerland. It is the joint-largest party in the Federal Council, third-largest party in the National Council, and second-largest in the Council of States....

 with 32.7% of the ballots. In the canton-wide election they received the highest proportion of votes. The second most popular party was the PDC
Christian Democratic People's Party of Switzerland
The Christian Democratic People's Party of Switzerland is a Christian democratic political party in Switzerland. It is the fourth-largest party in the National Council, with 31 seats, and the largest in the Council of States, with 15 seats. It has one seat, that of Doris Leuthard, on the Swiss...

 (with 14.9%), they were fifth in the canton-wide election, while the third most popular party was the Les Radicaux
Free Democratic Party of Switzerland
The Free Democratic Party was a classical liberal political party in Switzerland. It was one of the major parties in Switzerland until its merger with the smaller classical liberal Liberal Party, to form FDP.The Liberals on 1 January 2009....

 (with 10.7%), they were sixth in the canton-wide election.

For the 2009 Conseil d'Etat election, there were a total of 4,049 registered voters of which 2,286 (56.5%) voted.

In 2011, all the municipalities held local elections, and in Collonge-Bellerive there were 21 spots open on the municipal council. There were a total of 5,006 registered voters of which 2,250 (44.9%) voted. Out of the 2,250 votes, there were 36 blank votes, 17 null or unreadable votes and 212 votes with a name that was not on the list.

Economy

, Collonge-Bellerive had an unemployment rate of 3.8%. , there were 53 people employed in the primary economic sector and about 15 businesses involved in this sector. 634 people were employed in the secondary sector and there were 58 businesses in this sector. 2,669 people were employed in the tertiary sector, with 267 businesses in this sector. There were 2,805 residents of the municipality who were employed in some capacity, of which females made up 41.0% of the workforce.

the total number of full-time equivalent
Full-time equivalent
Full-time equivalent , is a unit to measure employed persons or students in a way that makes them comparable although they may work or study a different number of hours per week. FTE is often used to measure a worker's involvement in a project, or to track cost reductions in an organization...

 jobs was 2,846. The number of jobs in the primary sector was 46, of which 44 were in agriculture and 2 were in fishing or fisheries. The number of jobs in the secondary sector was 603 of which 362 or (60.0%) were in manufacturing and 241 (40.0%) were in construction. The number of jobs in the tertiary sector was 2,197. In the tertiary sector; 428 or 19.5% were in the sale or repair of motor vehicles, 46 or 2.1% were in the movement and storage of goods, 107 or 4.9% were in a hotel or restaurant, 515 or 23.4% were in the information industry, 31 or 1.4% were the insurance or financial industry, 166 or 7.6% were technical professionals or scientists, 162 or 7.4% were in education and 476 or 21.7% were in health care.

, there were 1,973 workers who commuted into the municipality and 2,242 workers who commuted away. The municipality is a net exporter of workers, with about 1.1 workers leaving the municipality for every one entering. About 17.6% of the workforce coming into Collonge-Bellerive are coming from outside Switzerland, while 0.3% of the locals commute out of Switzerland for work. Of the working population, 16.5% used public transportation to get to work, and 63.5% used a private car.

Religion

From the , 2,499 or 39.4% were Roman Catholic, while 1,457 or 23.0% belonged to the Swiss Reformed Church
Swiss Reformed Church
The Reformed branch of Protestantism in Switzerland was started in Zürich by Huldrych Zwingli and spread within a few years to Basel , Bern , St...

. Of the rest of the population, there were 159 members of an Orthodox church
Orthodox Christianity
The term Orthodox Christianity may refer to:* the Eastern Orthodox Church and its various geographical subdivisions...

 (or about 2.51% of the population), there were 8 individuals (or about 0.13% of the population) who belonged to the Christian Catholic Church
Christian Catholic Church of Switzerland
The Christian Catholic Church of Switzerland is the Swiss member church of the Union of Utrecht, also known as Old Catholic Church, originally founded by the jansenists, with a later influx of discontented Catholics following their disappointment with the First Vatican Council. It has 14,000...

, and there were 89 individuals (or about 1.40% of the population) who belonged to another Christian church. There were 93 individuals (or about 1.47% of the population) who were Jewish
Judaism
Judaism ) is the "religion, philosophy, and way of life" of the Jewish people...

, and 107 (or about 1.69% of the population) who were Islam
Islam
Islam . The most common are and .   : Arabic pronunciation varies regionally. The first vowel ranges from ~~. The second vowel ranges from ~~~...

ic. There were 21 individuals who were Buddhist
Buddhism
Buddhism is a religion and philosophy encompassing a variety of traditions, beliefs and practices, largely based on teachings attributed to Siddhartha Gautama, commonly known as the Buddha . The Buddha lived and taught in the northeastern Indian subcontinent some time between the 6th and 4th...

, 14 individuals who were Hindu
Hinduism
Hinduism is the predominant and indigenous religious tradition of the Indian Subcontinent. Hinduism is known to its followers as , amongst many other expressions...

 and 12 individuals who belonged to another church. 1,318 (or about 20.78% of the population) belonged to no church, are agnostic
Agnosticism
Agnosticism is the view that the truth value of certain claims—especially claims about the existence or non-existence of any deity, but also other religious and metaphysical claims—is unknown or unknowable....

 or atheist
Atheism
Atheism is, in a broad sense, the rejection of belief in the existence of deities. In a narrower sense, atheism is specifically the position that there are no deities...

, and 567 individuals (or about 8.94% of the population) did not answer the question.

Education

In Collonge-Bellerive about 1,574 or (24.8%) of the population have completed non-mandatory upper secondary education, and 1,920 or (30.3%) have completed additional higher education (either University or a Fachhochschule
Fachhochschule
A Fachhochschule or University of Applied Sciences is a German type of tertiary education institution, sometimes specialized in certain topical areas . Fachhochschulen were founded in Germany and later adopted by Austria, Liechtenstein, Switzerland and Greece...

). Of the 1,920 who completed tertiary schooling, 40.6% were Swiss men, 31.9% were Swiss women, 16.1% were non-Swiss men and 11.4% were non-Swiss women.

During the 2009-2010 school year there were a total of 1,851 students in the Collonge-Bellerive school system. The education system
Education in Switzerland
The education system in Switzerland is very diverse, because the constitution of Switzerland delegates the authority for the school system mainly to the cantons...

 in the Canton of Geneva allows young children to attend two years of non-obligatory Kindergarten
Kindergarten
A kindergarten is a preschool educational institution for children. The term was created by Friedrich Fröbel for the play and activity institute that he created in 1837 in Bad Blankenburg as a social experience for children for their transition from home to school...

. During that school year, there were 119 children who were in a pre-kindergarten class. The canton's school system provides two years of non-mandatory kindergarten
Kindergarten
A kindergarten is a preschool educational institution for children. The term was created by Friedrich Fröbel for the play and activity institute that he created in 1837 in Bad Blankenburg as a social experience for children for their transition from home to school...

 and requires students to attend six years of primary school, with some of the children attending smaller, specialized classes. In Collonge-Bellerive there were 215 students in kindergarten or primary school and 22 students were in the special, smaller classes. The secondary school
Secondary school
Secondary school is a term used to describe an educational institution where the final stage of schooling, known as secondary education and usually compulsory up to a specified age, takes place...

program consists of three lower, obligatory years of schooling, followed by three to five years of optional, advanced schools. There were 215 lower secondary students who attended school in Collonge-Bellerive. There were 362 upper secondary students from the municipality along with 45 students who were in a professional, non-university track program. An additional 540 students attended a private school.

, there were 506 students in Collonge-Bellerive who came from another municipality, while 692 residents attended schools outside the municipality.
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