Öckerö Municipality () is a

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

Västra Götaland County Västra Götaland County () is a county or '' län'' on the western coast of Sweden. The county is the second most populous of Sweden's counties and it comprises 49 municipalities (''kommuner''). Its population of 1,616,000 amounts to 17% of S ...

in western

Sweden Sweden, formally the Kingdom of Sweden, is a Nordic countries, Nordic country located on the Scandinavian Peninsula in Northern Europe. It borders Norway to the west and north, and Finland to the east. At , Sweden is the largest Nordic count ...

. Its seat is located in the town of Öckerö on the main

island An island or isle is a piece of land, distinct from a continent, completely surrounded by water. There are continental islands, which were formed by being split from a continent by plate tectonics, and oceanic islands, which have never been ...

, which is also called Öckerö. The municipality consists of islands in the Northern Gothenburg Archipelago just outside

Gothenburg Gothenburg ( ; ) is the List of urban areas in Sweden by population, second-largest city in Sweden, after the capital Stockholm, and the fifth-largest in the Nordic countries. Situated by the Kattegat on the west coast of Sweden, it is the gub ...

. With a total area of 26.03 km² it is one of the smallest

municipalities of Sweden The municipalities of Sweden () are its generally smaller but co-equal local government Legal entity, entities. There are 290 municipalities which are responsible for a large proportion of local services, including schools, emergency services a ...

. The municipality is one of very few in Sweden which has not been amalgamated and thus still has the same area as the unit formed out of a

parish A parish is a territorial entity in many Christianity, Christian denominations, constituting a division within a diocese. A parish is under the pastoral care and clerical jurisdiction of a priest#Christianity, priest, often termed a parish pries ...

(''socken'') by the first local government acts of 1862. In the period 1915–1959 there were a number of ''municipalsamhällen'' (a sort of

borough A borough is an administrative division in various English language, English-speaking countries. In principle, the term ''borough'' designates a self-governing walled town, although in practice, official use of the term varies widely. History ...

s within a rural municipality handling matters of urban character) in the municipality.

Geography

The municipality consists of ten year-round inhabited islands. They are considered to stretch from the

Vinga Lighthouse Vinga Lighthouse (), is a Swedish lighthouse on Vinga island. The present-day lighthouse was built in 1890, although Vinga has been a significant island for mariners long before that. This lighthouse is the third built on the island. It is one ...

up to the coastal town of

Marstrand Marstrand () is a seaside locality situated in Kungälv Municipality, Västra Götaland County, Sweden. It had 1,320 inhabitants in 2010. The town got its name from its location on the island of Marstrand. Despite its small population, for histo ...

in the municipality of

Kungälv Kungälv () is a cities of Sweden, city and the seat of Kungälv Municipality in Västra Götaland County, Sweden. It is also a part of Greater Gothenburg Metropolitan Area. It had 22,768 inhabitants in 2010. In 2021, the main Kungälv - Ytterby - ...

. The ten islands are named: # Björkö #

Fotö Fotö is an island and a locality in Öckerö Municipality, Västra Götaland County, Sweden Sweden, formally the Kingdom of Sweden, is a Nordic countries, Nordic country located on the Scandinavian Peninsula in Northern Europe. It borders ...

# Grötö #

Hyppeln Hyppeln is a Swedish island in the archipelago of Gothenburg, part of Öckerö Municipality. It is about long. "Hyppeln" is also the name of the village on the island, which has about 150 permanent residents. There is a shop and a guest harbour ...

Hälsö Hälsö () is an island and a locality situated in Öckerö Municipality, Västra Götaland County, Sweden with 611 inhabitants in 2010. Hälsö is situated in the northern part of the archipelago and offers nice harbour walks along small and win ...

Hönö Hönö is a locality situated in Öckerö Municipality, Västra Götaland County, Sweden Sweden, formally the Kingdom of Sweden, is a Nordic countries, Nordic country located on the Scandinavian Peninsula in Northern Europe. It borders Nor ...

Kalvsund Kalvsund is a locality situated in Öckerö Municipality, Västra Götaland County, Sweden Sweden, formally the Kingdom of Sweden, is a Nordic countries, Nordic country located on the Scandinavian Peninsula in Northern Europe. It borders N ...

# Källö-Knippla # Rörö # Öckerö N.B. that "ö" means "island" in Swedish, hence there are many names ending with "ö". E.g. ''Björkö'' means "Birch Island". Of these, Hönö is the largest with some 4,800 inhabitants, and Öckerö is also fairly large with 3,100. However, all ten are inhabited by people all year around. Most islands have bridge connection between each other. However, there is no road connection to the mainland, just car

ferries A ferry is a boat or ship that transports passengers, and occasionally vehicles and cargo, across a body of water. A small passenger ferry with multiple stops, like those in Venice, Italy, is sometimes referred to as a water taxi or water bus. ...

from western

. The ferry connections are good with a dense schedule. A local referendum in 2003 in Öckerö Municipality rejected the plans for a future bridge to the mainland.

Demographics

This is a demographic table based on Öckerö Municipality's electoral districts in the

2022 Swedish general election General elections were held in Sweden on 11 September 2022 to elect the 349 members of the Riksdag who in turn elected the Prime Minister of Sweden. Under the constitution, regional and municipal elections were also held on the same day. The pr ...

sourced from SVT's election platform, in turn taken from SCB official statistics. In total there were 12,895 residents, including 10,173 Swedish citizens of voting age. 38.3% voted for the left coalition and 60.6% for the right coalition.

History

During the

Viking Age The Viking Age (about ) was the period during the Middle Ages when Norsemen known as Vikings undertook large-scale raiding, colonising, conquest, and trading throughout Europe and reached North America. The Viking Age applies not only to their ...

the islands of Öckerö belonged to the Norwegian kings, and the part of the coast was known as ''Älvsyssel''. In the 13th century the King Hakon Hakonarson built himself a house on Öckerö, because he was often around there with his navy. In 1658 or thereabout, the area became Swedish together with

Bohuslän Bohuslän () is a Provinces of Sweden, Swedish province in Götaland, on the northernmost part of the country's west coast. It is bordered by Dalsland to the northeast, Västergötland to the southeast, the Skagerrak arm of the North Sea to the ...

. In the middle of the 18th century, the

fishing Fishing is the activity of trying to catch fish. Fish are often caught as wildlife from the natural environment (Freshwater ecosystem, freshwater or Marine ecosystem, marine), but may also be caught from Fish stocking, stocked Body of water, ...

herring Herring are various species of forage fish, belonging to the Order (biology), order Clupeiformes. Herring often move in large Shoaling and schooling, schools around fishing banks and near the coast, found particularly in shallow, temperate wate ...

blossomed into a full scaled industry, and the islands fishing communities flourished for some 50 years. In the 1950s the

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 last two being outer garments), originating in Europe. The coat of arms on an escutcheon f ...

were designed. As the main industry has always been fishing, a boat and herring became symbols. The ten herrings correspond to the ten islands. Ömål, also called öbo, is a Swedish Götamål dialect spoken on the islands of the Öckerö municipality. It has some features of the Gothenburg Swedish dialect (Göteborgska), but also features from English.

References

*The corresponding article on Swedish Wikipedia has been used as main reference.

External links

Öckerö Municipality
- Official site {{DEFAULTSORT:Ockero Municipality Municipalities of Västra Götaland County