Riddes

Riddes is a municipality in the district of Martigny in the canton of Valais in Switzerland.

History

Riddes is first mentioned in 1001 as ''Ride''. It was previously known its German name ''Riden'', though that is not used any more.

Geography

Riddes has an area, , of . Of this area, 37.4% is used for agricultural purposes, while 37.1% is forested. Of the rest of the land, 9.1% is settled (buildings or roads) and 16.4% is unproductive land.

The municipality is located in the Martigny district, on the left bank of the Rhone. It consists of the village of Riddes, the hamlet of Auddes, and the vacation resorts of La Tzoumaz in Mayens-de-Riddes and Écône.

Coat of arms

The blazon of the municipal coat of arms is ''Trierced per pale wavy Azure a wheat ear Or in chief two Mullets of Five Argent, Argent a bridge masoned towered Sable and Gules a Grille Or.''

Demographics

Riddes has a population () of . , 24.0% of the population are resident foreign nationals.Swiss Federal Statistical Office - Superweb database - Gemeinde Statistics 1981-2008
accessed 19 June 2010 Over the last 10 years (2000–2010 ) the population has changed at a rate of 25.4%. It has changed at a rate of 18.1% due to migration and at a rate of 1.5% due to births and deaths.
accessed 16-September-2011

Most of the population () speaks French (1,945 or 88.5%) as their first language, Portuguese is the second most common (106 or 4.8%) and German is the third (72 or 3.3%). There are 33 people who speak Italian and 2 people who speak Romansh.

, the population was 51.6% male and 48.4% female. The population was made up of 983 Swiss men (37.2% of the population) and 380 (14.4%) non-Swiss men. There were 1,007 Swiss women (38.1%) and 273 (10.3%) non-Swiss women.Ständige Wohnbevolkerung nach Geschlecht und Heimat am 31.12.2009.xls
accessed 24 August 2011

Of the population in the municipality, 925 or about 42.1% were born in Riddes and lived there in 2000. There were 654 or 29.8% who were born in the same canton, while 178 or 8.1% were born somewhere else in Switzerland, and 354 or 16.1% were born outside of Switzerland.

, children and teenagers (0–19 years old) make up 22.3% of the population, while adults (20–64 years old) make up 61.1% and seniors (over 64 years old) make up 16.6%. , there were 912 people who were single and never married in the municipality. There were 1,007 married individuals, 166 widows or widowers and 112 individuals who are divorced.STAT-TAB Datenwürfel für Thema 40.3 - 2000
accessed 2 February 2011

, there were 831 private households in the municipality, and an average of 2.4 persons per household. There were 256 households that consist of only one person and 66 households with five or more people. , a total of 817 apartments (49.3% of the total) were permanently occupied, while 721 apartments (43.5%) were seasonally occupied and 118 apartments (7.1%) 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 3 new units per 1000 residents. The vacancy rate for the municipality, , was 0.11%.

The historical population is given in the following chart:

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bar:1802 from:start till:195 text:"195"
bar:1850 from:start till:487 text:"487"
bar:1860 from:start till:609 text:"609"
bar:1870 from:start till:668 text:"668"
bar:1880 from:start till:685 text:"685"
bar:1888 from:start till:767 text:"767"
bar:1900 from:start till:892 text:"892"
bar:1910 from:start till:929 text:"929"
bar:1920 from:start till:1008 text:"1,008"
bar:1930 from:start till:987 text:"987"
bar:1941 from:start till:1086 text:"1,086"
bar:1950 from:start till:1262 text:"1,262"
bar:1960 from:start till:1471 text:"1,471"
bar:1970 from:start till:1725 text:"1,725"
bar:1980 from:start till:1786 text:"1,786"
bar:1990 from:start till:1977 text:"1,977"
bar:2000 from:start till:2197 text:"2,197"

Politics

In the 2007 federal election the most popular party was the FDP which received 30.97% of the vote. The next three most popular parties were the SVP (20.01%), the CVP (17.66%) and the SP (17.43%). In the federal election, a total of 1,008 votes were cast, and the voter turnout was 66.1%.

In the 2009 Conseil d'État/Staatsrat election a total of 916 votes were cast, of which 34 or about 3.7% were invalid. The voter participation was 59.6%, which is similar to the cantonal average of 54.67%. In the 2007 Swiss Council of States election a total of 1,003 votes were cast, of which 62 or about 6.2% were invalid. The voter participation was 66.3%, which is much more than the cantonal average of 59.88%.

Economy

, Riddes had an unemployment rate of 6.6%. , there were 140 people employed in the primary economic sector and about 49 businesses involved in this sector. 288 people were employed in the secondary sector and there were 26 businesses in this sector. 567 people were employed in the tertiary sector, with 86 businesses in this sector. There were 1,023 residents of the municipality who were employed in some capacity, of which females made up 41.3% of the workforce.

the total number of full-time equivalent jobs was 807. The number of jobs in the primary sector was 93, all of which were in agriculture. The number of jobs in the secondary sector was 272 of which 148 or (54.4%) were in manufacturing and 69 (25.4%) were in construction. The number of jobs in the tertiary sector was 442. In the tertiary sector; 177 or 40.0% were in wholesale or retail sales or the repair of motor vehicles, 12 or 2.7% were in the movement and storage of goods, 43 or 9.7% were in a hotel or restaurant, 1 was in the information industry, 15 or 3.4% were the insurance or financial industry, 29 or 6.6% were technical professionals or scientists, 11 or 2.5% were in education and 81 or 18.3% were in health care.

, there were 324 workers who commuted into the municipality and 522 workers who commuted away. The municipality is a net exporter of workers, with about 1.6 workers leaving the municipality for every one entering.Swiss Federal Statistical Office - Statweb
accessed 24 June 2010 Of the working population, 12.3% used public transportation to get to work, and 63.9% used a private car.

Religion

From the , 1,910 or 86.9% were Roman Catholic, while 98 or 4.5% belonged to the Swiss Reformed Church. Of the rest of the population, there was 1 member of an Orthodox church, and there were 9 individuals (or about 0.41% of the population) who belonged to another Christian church. There was 1 individual who was Jewish, and 18 (or about 0.82% of the population) who were Islamic. There were 2 individuals who were Buddhist and 4 individuals who belonged to another church. 64 (or about 2.91% of the population) belonged to no church, are agnostic or atheist, and 93 individuals (or about 4.23% of the population) did not answer the question.

The International Seminary of Saint Pius X, the premier seminary of the Society of Saint Pius X, is located in Écône in Riddle. It is one of the six houses for formation for the future priests of The Society of Saint Pius X. The Seminary of Écône was founded in 1970 by Archbishop Marcel Lefebvre, and his tomb can be found there.

Education

In Riddes about 676 or (30.8%) of the population have completed non-mandatory upper secondary education, and 143 or (6.5%) have completed additional higher education (either university or a ''Fachhochschule''). Of the 143 who completed tertiary schooling, 60.1% were Swiss men, 21.0% were Swiss women, 15.4% were non-Swiss men and 3.5% were non-Swiss women.

, there were 75 students in Riddes who came from another municipality, while 113 residents attended schools outside the municipality.

Riddes is home to the ''Bibliothèque communale et scolaire'' library. The library has () 6,867 books or other media, and loaned out 8,328 items in the same year. It was open a total of 160 days with average of 8 hours per week during that year.Swiss Federal Statistical Office, list of libraries
accessed 14 May 2010

See also

* Écône
*La Tzoumaz
*The International Seminary of Saint Pius X

References

External links

Official website

*

{{Authority control

Municipalities of Valais