Arch is a

municipality A municipality is usually a single administrative division having corporate status and powers of self-government or jurisdiction as granted by national and regional laws to which it is subordinate. The term ''municipality'' may also mean the go ...

in the Seeland administrative district in the canton of

Bern german: Berner(in)french: Bernois(e) it, bernese , neighboring_municipalities = Bremgarten bei Bern, Frauenkappelen, Ittigen, Kirchlindach, Köniz, Mühleberg, Muri bei Bern, Neuenegg, Ostermundigen, Wohlen bei Bern, Zollikofen , website ...

Switzerland ). Swiss law does not designate a ''capital'' as such, but the federal parliament and government are installed in Bern, while other federal institutions, such as the federal courts, are in other cities (Bellinzona, Lausanne, Luzern, Neuchâtel ...

. It is also a church parish of the

Swiss Reformed Church The Protestant Church in Switzerland (PCS), (EKS); french: Église évangélique réformée de Suisse (EERS); it, Chiesa evangelica riformata in Svizzera (CERiS); rm, Baselgia evangelica refurmada da la Svizra (BRRS) formerly named Federation o ...

History

The first historical mention of the town was in 1236 as Archo. The earliest traces of human settlements around Arch include scattered

neolithic The Neolithic period, or New Stone Age, is an Old World archaeological period and the final division of the Stone Age. It saw the Neolithic Revolution, a wide-ranging set of developments that appear to have arisen independently in several parts ...

items and

Hallstatt culture The Hallstatt culture was the predominant Western Europe, Western and Central European Archaeological culture, culture of Late Bronze Age Europe, Bronze Age (Hallstatt A, Hallstatt B) from the 12th to 8th centuries BC and Early Iron Age Europe ...

grave mounds A tumulus (plural tumuli) is a mound of earth and stones raised over a grave or graves. Tumuli are also known as barrows, burial mounds or ''kurgans'', and may be found throughout much of the world. A cairn, which is a mound of stones built ...

. During the

Roman era In modern historiography, ancient Rome refers to Roman civilisation from the founding of the city of Rome in the 8th century BC to the collapse of the Western Roman Empire in the 5th century AD. It encompasses the Roman Kingdom (753–509 BC ...

Arch was on the

Petinesca Petinesca is an archeological site on the territory of Studen, a community of the Canton of Bern, in Switzerland, where Celtic and Roman vestiges were found. Celtic and Roman vestiges The site lies at the SE edge of the Jensberg mountain. C ...

-Salodurum (

Solothurn Solothurn ( , ; french: Soleure ; it, Soletta ; rm, ) is a List of towns in Switzerland, town, a Municipalities of Switzerland, municipality, and the Capital (political), capital of the canton of Solothurn in Switzerland. It is located in the n ...

) road. During the

High Middle Ages The High Middle Ages, or High Medieval Period, was the periodization, period of European history that lasted from AD 1000 to 1300. The High Middle Ages were preceded by the Early Middle Ages and were followed by the Late Middle Ages, which ended ...

an earthen and wooden castle stood on the Schlosshubel or Maierislihubel. Originally it was part of the ''

Herrschaft The German term ''Herrschaft'' (plural: ''Herrschaften'') covers a broad semantic field and only the context will tell whether it means, "rule", "power", "dominion", "authority", "territory" or "lordship". In its most abstract sense, it refers ...

'' of Strassberg but in 1388 it was acquired by

. In 1393 it became part of the newly created

bailiwick A bailiwick () is usually the area of jurisdiction of a bailiff, and once also applied to territories in which a privately appointed bailiff exercised the sheriff's functions under a royal or imperial writ. The bailiwick is probably modelled on th ...

of Buren. The village church was originally a romanesque structure which was built in the 10th century. The building was first mentioned in 1275. In 1528 it switched to the new religion during the

Protestant Reformation The Reformation (alternatively named the Protestant Reformation or the European Reformation) was a major movement within Western Christianity in 16th-century Europe that posed a religious and political challenge to the Catholic Church and in ...

, and two years later the

choir A choir ( ; also known as a chorale or chorus) is a musical ensemble of singers. Choral music, in turn, is the music written specifically for such an ensemble to perform. Choirs may perform music from the classical music repertoire, which ...

was rebuilt. In 1561, a ferry across the

Aare The Aare () or Aar () is a tributary of the High Rhine and the longest river that both rises and ends entirely within Switzerland. Its total length from its source to its junction with the Rhine comprises about , during which distance it descend ...

was set up, though the village remained primarily agricultural. In the 19th century improving agricultural technology reduced the demand for agricultural workers and left many in the village without jobs. However, the

Jura water correction The correction of the waters of the Swiss Jura consisted of a wide series of hydrological undertakings carried out in Switzerland in the region of the three lakes: Lake Morat connected to Lake Neuchatel by the Broye Canal, the latter connected t ...

of the late 19th century opened up new farming land. Further land reclamation projects took place in 1918-26 and 1980. The 1980 project also built the A5 motorway which helped connect the village with surrounding towns. The first bridge over the Aare at Arch was built in 1874. It was followed two years later with the Solothurn-Lyss railway line. The bridge and railroad opened up new job opportunities, first in the watch industry and later in various industries. During the 20th century several factories opened in Arch including gravel mining and metal processing (1942), a machinery factory (1966), construction equipment (1946), and suppliers to the watch industry. With all the factories, many workers commuted into Arch for work from the surrounding villages. Arch grew into a regional center and in 1972 the secondary school for the Ruti-Arch-Leuzigen district was built in Arch.

Notable structures

In Arch there are two blocks of multi-family homes and one of single-family homes, built to conform with

MINERGIE Minergie is a registered quality label for new and refurbished low-energy-consumption buildings. This label is mutually supported by the Swiss Confederation, the Swiss Cantons and the Principality of Liechtenstein along with Trade and Industry. T ...

, a Swiss trademark for sustainable construction. Because of these buildings, the municipality is ranked third among the municipalities of the canton in energy awareness.

Geography

Arch has an area of . Of this area, or 51.6% is used for agricultural purposes, while or 27.5% is forested. Of the rest of the land, or 16.0% is settled (buildings or roads), or 4.9% is either rivers or lakes and or 0.6% is unproductive land.Swiss Federal Statistical Office-Land Use Statistics
2009 data accessed 25 March 2010 Of the built up area, housing and buildings made up 6.3% and transportation infrastructure made up 6.4%. Power and water infrastructure as well as other special developed areas made up 2.4% of the area Out of the forested land, 25.9% of the total land area is heavily forested and 1.6% is covered with orchards or small clusters of trees. Of the agricultural land, 40.3% is used for growing crops and 10.0% is pastures, while 1.3% is used for orchards or vine crops. All the water in the municipality is flowing water. The municipality is located on the right bank of the

River and is bordered on both the north and south by the

Canton of Solothurn The canton of Solothurn or canton of Soleure (german: Kanton Solothurn rm, Chantun Soloturn french: Canton de Soleure; it, Canton Soletta) is a canton of Switzerland. It is located in the northwest of Switzerland. The capital is Solothurn. Hi ...

. It consists of the village of Arch (divided into Oberdorf, Unterdorf and Ausserdorf), the neighborhoods of Aebnit, Breiten and Leimacher-Mätteli as well as the Sibenmatt and Berghof farms. On 31 December 2009 Amtsbezirk Büren, the municipality's former district, was dissolved. On the following day, 1 January 2010, it joined the newly created Verwaltungskreis Seeland.Nomenklaturen – Amtliches Gemeindeverzeichnis der Schweiz
accessed 4 April 2011

Coat of arms

The

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. The verb ''to blazon'' means to create such a description. The vis ...

of the municipal

coat of arms A coat of arms is a heraldry, heraldic communication design, visual design on an escutcheon (heraldry), escutcheon (i.e., shield), surcoat, or tabard (the latter two being outer garments). The coat of arms on an escutcheon forms the central ele ...

is ''Azure on a base wavy Argent the Ark Or and in chief a Dove Argent volant holding in beak an Olive branch proper.'' This is an example of

canting arms Canting arms are heraldic bearings that represent the bearer's name (or, less often, some attribute or function) in a visual pun or rebus. French heralds used the term (), as they would sound out the name of the armiger. Many armorial allus ...

with the ark (german: Arche).

Demographics

Arch has a population () of . , 8.0% of the population are resident foreign nationals.Statistical office of the Canton of Bern
accessed 4 January 2012 Over the last 10 years (2000-2010) the population has changed at a rate of -2.5%. Migration accounted for -2.7%, while births and deaths accounted for 1.2%.
accessed 16-August-2012 Most of the population () speaks

German German(s) may refer to: * Germany (of or related to) **Germania (historical use) * Germans, citizens of Germany, people of German ancestry, or native speakers of the German language ** For citizens of Germany, see also German nationality law **Ger ...

(1,502 or 94.6%) as their first language, French is the second most common (24 or 1.5%) and

Italian Italian(s) may refer to: * Anything of, from, or related to the people of Italy over the centuries ** Italians, an ethnic group or simply a citizen of the Italian Republic or Italian Kingdom ** Italian language, a Romance language *** Regional Ita ...

is the third (9 or 0.6%). , the population was 49.6% male and 50.4% female. The population was made up of 692 Swiss men (45.2% of the population) and 67 (4.4%) non-Swiss men. There were 716 Swiss women (46.8%) and 5 (0.3%) non-Swiss women. Of the population in the municipality, 445 or about 28.0% were born in Arch and lived there in 2000. There were 506 or 31.9% who were born in the same canton, while 451 or 28.4% were born somewhere else in Switzerland, and 135 or 8.5% were born outside of Switzerland. , children and teenagers (0–19 years old) make up 21.4% of the population, while adults (20–64 years old) make up 63.4% and seniors (over 64 years old) make up 15.2%. , there were 639 people who were single and never married in the municipality. There were 803 married individuals, 68 widows or widowers and 78 individuals who are divorced.STAT-TAB Datenwürfel für Thema 40.3 - 2000
accessed 2 February 2011 , there were 162 households that consist of only one person and 46 households with five or more people. , a total of 618 apartments (92.4% of the total) were permanently occupied, while 26 apartments (3.9%) were seasonally occupied and 25 apartments (3.7%) were empty.Swiss Federal Statistical Office STAT-TAB - Datenwürfel für Thema 09.2 - Gebäude und Wohnungen
accessed 28 January 2011 , the construction rate of new housing units was 2 new units per 1000 residents. The vacancy rate for the municipality, , was 2.66%. The historical population is given in the following chart: Colors= id:lightgrey value:gray(0.9) id:darkgrey value:gray(0.8) ImageSize = width:1020 height:210 PlotArea = top:10 left:100 bottom:50 right:100 AlignBars = justify DateFormat = x.y Period = from:0 till:1600 TimeAxis = orientation:vertical AlignBars = justify ScaleMajor = gridcolor:darkgrey increment:300 start:0 ScaleMinor = gridcolor:lightgrey increment:60 start:0 PlotData= color:yellowgreen width:40 mark:(line,white) align:center bar:1764 from:start till:234 text:"234" bar:1850 from:start till:512 text:"512" bar:1860 from:start till:510 text:"510" bar:1870 from:start till:551 text:"551" bar:1880 from:start till:579 text:"579" bar:1888 from:start till:620 text:"620" bar:1900 from:start till:654 text:"654" bar:1910 from:start till:695 text:"695" bar:1920 from:start till:726 text:"726" bar:1930 from:start till:778 text:"778" bar:1941 from:start till:736 text:"736" bar:1950 from:start till:796 text:"796" bar:1960 from:start till:968 text:"968" bar:1970 from:start till:1063 text:"1,063" bar:1980 from:start till:1162 text:"1,162" bar:1990 from:start till:1313 text:"1,313" bar:2000 from:start till:1588 text:"1,588"

Politics

In the 2011 federal election the most popular party was the SVP which received 35.6% of the vote. The next three most popular parties were the BDP Party (29.2%), the

SPS SPS may refer to: Law and government * Agreement on the Application of Sanitary and Phytosanitary Measures of the WTO * NATO Science for Peace and Security * Single Payment Scheme, an EU agricultural subsidy * The Standard Procurement System, fo ...

(12%) and the

Green Party A green party is a formally organized political party based on the principles of green politics, such as social justice, environmentalism and nonviolence. Greens believe that these issues are inherently related to one another as a foundation ...

(6.3%). In the federal election, a total of 471 votes were cast, and the

voter turnout In political science, voter turnout is the participation rate (often defined as those who cast a ballot) of a given election. This can be the percentage of registered voters, eligible voters, or all voting-age people. According to Stanford Unive ...

was 40.5%.Swiss Federal Statistical Office 2011 Election
accessed 8 May 2012

Economy

, Arch had an unemployment rate of 1.07%. , there were a total of 570 people employed in the municipality. Of these, there were 36 people employed in the primary economic sector and about 14 businesses involved in this sector. 317 people were employed in the

secondary sector In macroeconomics, the secondary sector of the economy is an economic sector in the three-sector theory that describes the role of manufacturing. It encompasses industries that produce a finished, usable product or are involved in construction. ...

and there were 31 businesses in this sector. 217 people were employed in the

tertiary sector The tertiary sector of the economy, generally known as the service sector, is the third of the three economic sectors in the three-sector model (also known as the economic cycle). The others are the primary sector (raw materials) and the second ...

, with 47 businesses in this sector. there were a total of 475

full-time equivalent Full-time equivalent (FTE), or whole time equivalent (WTE), is a unit that indicates the workload of an employee, employed person (or student) in a way that makes workloads or class loads comparable across various contexts. FTE is often used to me ...

jobs. The number of jobs in the primary sector was 24, all of which were in agriculture. The number of jobs in the secondary sector was 292 of which 265 or (90.8%) were in manufacturing, 5 or (1.7%) were in mining and 22 (7.5%) were in construction. The number of jobs in the tertiary sector was 159. In the tertiary sector; 48 or 30.2% were in wholesale or retail sales or the repair of motor vehicles, 25 or 15.7% were in the movement and storage of goods, 10 or 6.3% were in a hotel or restaurant, 2 or 1.3% were in the information industry, 4 or 2.5% were technical professionals or scientists, 19 or 11.9% were in education and 36 or 22.6% were in health care. , there were 290 workers who commuted into the municipality and 614 workers who commuted away. The municipality is a net exporter of workers, with about 2.1 workers leaving the municipality for every one entering.Swiss Federal Statistical Office - Statweb
accessed 24 June 2010 Of the working population, 10.8% used public transportation to get to work, and 61.5% used a private car.

Religion

From the , 249 or 15.7% were

Roman Catholic Roman or Romans most often refers to: *Rome, the capital city of Italy *Ancient Rome, Roman civilization from 8th century BC to 5th century AD *Roman people, the people of ancient Rome *'' Epistle to the Romans'', shortened to ''Romans'', a lette ...

, while 1,078 or 67.9% belonged to the

. Of the rest of the population, there were 4 members of an Orthodox church (or about 0.25% of the population), there were 3 individuals (or about 0.19% of the population) who belonged to the Christian Catholic Church, and there were 75 individuals (or about 4.72% of the population) who belonged to another Christian church. There was 1 individual who was

Jewish Jews ( he, יְהוּדִים, , ) or Jewish people are an ethnoreligious group and nation originating from the Israelites Israelite origins and kingdom: "The first act in the long drama of Jewish history is the age of the Israelites""The ...

, and 24 (or about 1.51% of the population) who were

Islam Islam (; ar, ۘالِإسلَام, , ) is an Abrahamic religions, Abrahamic Monotheism#Islam, monotheistic religion centred primarily around the Quran, a religious text considered by Muslims to be the direct word of God in Islam, God (or ...

ic. There were 4 individuals who were

Buddhist Buddhism ( , ), also known as Buddha Dharma and Dharmavinaya (), is an Indian religion or philosophical tradition based on teachings attributed to the Buddha. It originated in northern India as a -movement in the 5th century BCE, and ...

and 18 individuals who were

Hindu Hindus (; ) are people who religiously adhere to Hinduism.Jeffery D. Long (2007), A Vision for Hinduism, IB Tauris, , pages 35–37 Historically, the term has also been used as a geographical, cultural, and later religious identifier for ...

. 128 (or about 8.06% of the population) belonged to no church, are

agnostic Agnosticism is the view or belief that the existence of God, of the divine or the supernatural is unknown or unknowable. (page 56 in 1967 edition) Another definition provided is the view that "human reason is incapable of providing sufficient ...

atheist Atheism, in the broadest sense, is an absence of belief in the existence of deities. Less broadly, atheism is a rejection of the belief that any deities exist. In an even narrower sense, atheism is specifically the position that there no ...

, and 41 individuals (or about 2.58% of the population) did not answer the question.

Education

In Arch about 710 or (44.7%) of the population have completed non-mandatory upper secondary education, and 128 or (8.1%) have completed additional higher education (either

university A university () is an institution of higher (or tertiary) education and research which awards academic degrees in several academic disciplines. Universities typically offer both undergraduate and postgraduate programs. In the United States, t ...

or a ''

Fachhochschule A ''Fachhochschule'' (; plural ''Fachhochschulen''), abbreviated FH, is a university of applied sciences (UAS), in other words a German tertiary education institution that provides professional education in many applied sciences and applied arts ...

''). Of the 128 who completed tertiary schooling, 74.2% were Swiss men, 21.1% were Swiss women, 3.9% were non-Swiss men. The Canton of Bern school system provides one year of non-obligatory

Kindergarten Kindergarten is a preschool educational approach based on playing, singing, practical activities such as drawing, and social interaction as part of the transition from home to school. Such institutions were originally made in the late 18th cent ...

, followed by six years of Primary school. This is followed by three years of obligatory lower Secondary school where the students are separated according to ability and aptitude. Following the lower Secondary students may attend additional schooling or they may enter an

apprenticeship Apprenticeship is a system for training a new generation of practitioners of a Tradesman, trade or profession with on-the-job training and often some accompanying study (classroom work and reading). Apprenticeships can also enable practitioners ...

. During the 2009-10 school year, there were a total of 232 students attending classes in Arch. There were 2 kindergarten classes with a total of 29 students in the municipality. Of the kindergarten students, 3.4% were permanent or temporary residents of Switzerland (not citizens) and 13.8% have a different mother language than the classroom language. The municipality had 6 primary classes and 105 students. Of the primary students, 6.7% were permanent or temporary residents of Switzerland (not citizens) and 4.8% have a different mother language than the classroom language. During the same year, there were 6 lower secondary classes with a total of 98 students. There were 5.1% who were permanent or temporary residents of Switzerland (not citizens) and 4.1% have a different mother language than the classroom language.Schuljahr 2010/11 pdf document
accessed 4 January 2012 , there were 83 students in Arch who came from another municipality, while 85 residents attended schools outside the municipality.

References

External links

*
Vereinigung für Heimatpflege Büren
Distributor of numerous publications about Arch and the Büren district {{Authority control Municipalities of the canton of Bern Articles which contain graphical timelines