Rodersdorf
Encyclopedia
Rodersdorf 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...

 in the district of Dorneck
Dorneck (district)
Dorneck District is one of the ten districts of the canton of Solothurn in Switzerland, situated to the north of the canton. Together with Thierstein District, it forms the Amtei of Dorneck-Thierstein. Ithas a population of...

 in the canton
Cantons of Switzerland
The 26 cantons of Switzerland are the member states of the federal state of Switzerland. Each canton was a fully sovereign state with its own borders, army and currency from the Treaty of Westphalia until the establishment of the Swiss federal state in 1848...

 of Solothurn in 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....

, on the border to Alsace
Alsace
Alsace is the fifth-smallest of the 27 regions of France in land area , and the smallest in metropolitan France. It is also the seventh-most densely populated region in France and third most densely populated region in metropolitan France, with ca. 220 inhabitants per km²...

, France
France
The French Republic , The French Republic , The French Republic , (commonly known as France , is a unitary semi-presidential republic in Western Europe with several overseas territories and islands located on other continents and in the Indian, Pacific, and Atlantic oceans. Metropolitan France...

.

History

Rodersdorf is first mentioned in 1226 as Ratolsdorf. In 1349 it was mentioned as Roderstorff.

Geography

Rodersdorf has an area, , of 5.34 square kilometres (2.1 sq mi). Of this area, 2.9 km² (1.1 sq mi) or 54.3% is used for agricultural purposes, while 1.63 km² (0.629346518505832 sq mi) or 30.5% is forested. Of the rest of the land, 0.76 km² (0.293437640530327 sq mi) or 14.2% is settled (buildings or roads) and 0.01 km² (2.5 acre) or 0.2% is unproductive land.

Of the built up area, housing and buildings made up 8.8% and transportation infrastructure made up 3.7%. while parks, green belts and sports fields made up 1.5%. Out of the forested land, 28.7% of the total land area is heavily forested and 1.9% is covered with orchards or small clusters of trees. Of the agricultural land, 41.9% is used for growing crops and 9.9% is pastures, while 2.4% is used for orchards or vine crops.

The municipality is located in the Dorneck district, in the upper Leimen valley. The municipality is located in an exclave of the Canton of Solothurn, bordered by Basel-Country
Basel-Country
Basel-Landschaft , is one of the 26 cantons of Switzerland. The capital is Liestal...

 and Alsace
Alsace
Alsace is the fifth-smallest of the 27 regions of France in land area , and the smallest in metropolitan France. It is also the seventh-most densely populated region in France and third most densely populated region in metropolitan France, with ca. 220 inhabitants per km²...

.

Coat of arms

The blazon
Blazon
In heraldry and heraldic vexillology, a blazon is a formal description of a coat of arms, flag or similar emblem, from which the reader can reconstruct the appropriate image...

 of the municipal coat of arms
Coat of arms
A coat of arms is a unique heraldic design on a shield or escutcheon or on a surcoat or tabard used to cover and protect armour and to identify the wearer. Thus the term is often stated as "coat-armour", because it was anciently displayed on the front of a coat of cloth...

 is Per pale Gules and Argent two Fishes embowed addorsed counterchanged.

Demographics

Rodersdorf has a population of . , 8.9% of the population are resident foreign nationals. Over the last 10 years (1999–2009 ) the population has changed at a rate of -1.6%.

Most of the population speaks 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....

 (1,229 or 96.1%), with 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...

 being second most common (16 or 1.3%) and 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 third (12 or 0.9%). There is 1 person who speaks Romansh.

, the gender distribution of the population was 49.0% male and 51.0% female. The population was made up of 564 Swiss men (43.2% of the population) and 75 (5.7%) non-Swiss men. There were 603 Swiss women (46.2%) and 63 (4.8%) non-Swiss women. Of the population in the municipality 300 or about 23.5% were born in Rodersdorf and lived there in 2000. There were 79 or 6.2% who were born in the same canton, while 682 or 53.3% were born somewhere else in Switzerland, and 178 or 13.9% were born outside of Switzerland.

In there were 7 live births to Swiss citizens and were 5 deaths of Swiss citizens. Ignoring immigration and emigration, the population of Swiss citizens increased by 2 while the foreign population remained the same. There were 2 Swiss men who immigrated back to Switzerland. At the same time, there was 1 non-Swiss man who immigrated from another country to Switzerland. The total Swiss population change in 2008 (from all sources, including moves across municipal borders) was a decrease of 8 and the non-Swiss population remained the same. This represents a population growth rate of -0.6%.

The age distribution, , in Rodersdorf is; 110 children or 8.6% of the population are between 0 and 6 years old and 242 teenagers or 18.9% are between 7 and 19. Of the adult population, 54 people or 4.2% of the population are between 20 and 24 years old. 321 people or 25.1% are between 25 and 44, and 434 people or 33.9% are between 45 and 64. The senior population distribution is 96 people or 7.5% of the population are between 65 and 79 years old and there are 22 people or 1.7% who are over 80.

, there were 507 people who were single and never married in the municipality. There were 696 married individuals, 29 widows or widowers and 47 individuals who are divorced.

the average number of residents per living room was 0.53 which is about equal to the cantonal average of 0.56 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 76.9% 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 469 private households in the municipality, and an average of 2.7 persons per household. There were 78 households that consist of only one person and 46 households with five or more people. Out of a total of 474 households that answered this question, 16.5% were households made up of just one person. Of the rest of the households, there are 158 married couples without children, 200 married couples with children There were 31 single parents with a child or children. There were 2 households that were made up of unrelated people and 5 households that were made up of some sort of institution or another collective housing.

there were 333 single family homes (or 80.4% of the total) out of a total of 414 inhabited buildings. There were 27 multi-family buildings (6.5%), along with 44 multi-purpose buildings that were mostly used for housing (10.6%) and 10 other use buildings (commercial or industrial) that also had some housing (2.4%). Of the single family homes 32 were built before 1919, while 59 were built between 1990 and 2000. The greatest number of single family homes (103) were built between 1971 and 1980.

there were 484 apartments in the municipality. The most common apartment size was 5 rooms of which there were 170. There were 4 single room apartments and 309 apartments with five or more rooms. Of these apartments, a total of 458 apartments (94.6% of the total) were permanently occupied, while 19 apartments (3.9%) were seasonally occupied and 7 apartments (1.4%) were empty. , the construction rate of new housing units was 1.6 new units per 1000 residents. The vacancy rate for the municipality, , was 0.58%.

The historical population is given in the following chart:

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 SP
Social Democratic Party of Switzerland
The Social Democratic Party of Switzerland is the largest centre-left political party in Switzerland....

 which received 28.42% 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...

 (21.31%), 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:...

 (18.51%) and 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...

 (15.71%). In the federal election, a total of 605 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 63.4%.

Economy

, Rodersdorf had an unemployment rate of 1.3%. , there were 34 people employed in the primary economic sector and about 10 businesses involved in this sector. 34 people were employed in the secondary sector and there were 6 businesses in this sector. 69 people were employed in the tertiary sector, with 28 businesses in this sector. There were 647 residents of the municipality who were employed in some capacity, of which females made up 42.3% 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 105. The number of jobs in the primary sector was 21, all of which were in agriculture. The number of jobs in the secondary sector was 32 of which 18 or (56.3%) were in manufacturing and 14 (43.8%) were in construction. The number of jobs in the tertiary sector was 52. In the tertiary sector; 6 or 11.5% were in the sale or repair of motor vehicles, 4 or 7.7% were in the movement and storage of goods, 10 or 19.2% were in a hotel or restaurant, 1 was in the information industry, 2 or 3.8% were the insurance or financial industry, 8 or 15.4% were technical professionals or scientists, 8 or 15.4% were in education.

, there were 115 workers who commuted into the municipality and 525 workers who commuted away. The municipality is a net exporter of workers, with about 4.6 workers leaving the municipality for every one entering. About 29.6% of the workforce coming into Rodersdorf are coming from outside Switzerland. Of the working population, 40% used public transportation to get to work, and 42.2% used a private car.

Religion

From the , 429 or 33.5% were Roman Catholic, while 403 or 31.5% 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 3 individuals (or about 0.23% 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 38 individuals (or about 2.97% of the population) who belonged to another Christian church. There were 3 (or about 0.23% 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 2 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...

, 6 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 2 individuals who belonged to another church. 355 (or about 27.76% 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 38 individuals (or about 2.97% of the population) did not answer the question.

Education

In Rodersdorf about 510 or (39.9%) of the population have completed non-mandatory upper secondary education, and 270 or (21.1%) 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 270 who completed tertiary schooling, 58.1% were Swiss men, 30.0% were Swiss women, 9.6% were non-Swiss men and 2.2% were non-Swiss women.

During the 2010-2011 school year there were a total of 89 students in the Rodersdorf 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 Solothurn 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 17 children in kindergarten. The canton's school system requires students to attend six years of primary school, with some of the children attending smaller, specialized classes. In the municipality there were 72 students in primary school. 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. All the lower secondary students from Rodersdorf attend their school in a neighboring municipality.

, there were 154 students from Rodersdorf who attended schools outside the municipality.

Transportation

Rodersdorf it the end station of the 10 line
10 line (BLT)
BLT's 10 line is the second longest tramline in Europe at 25.6 km in length. The line in the region of Basel, Switzerland, is operated by Baselland Transport ....

 of Baselland Transport
Baselland Transport
Baselland Transport is a public transport company in Basel, Switzerland. It operates the more suburban routes and its vehicles wear a yellow-and-red colour scheme...

.

External links

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