Saint-Luc () is a village in the district of
Sierre
Sierre (; ; ) is the capital municipality of the district of Sierre, located in the canton of Valais, Switzerland. It has a population of 18,020.
Sierre is nicknamed City of the Sun () for its average of 300 days of sunshine a year.
It is t ...
in the
Swiss
Swiss most commonly refers to:
* the adjectival form of Switzerland
* Swiss people
Swiss may also refer to: Places
* Swiss, Missouri
* Swiss, North Carolina
* Swiss, West Virginia
* Swiss, Wisconsin
Other uses
* Swiss Café, an old café located ...
canton of
Valais
Valais ( , ; ), more formally, the Canton of Valais or Wallis, is one of the cantons of Switzerland, 26 cantons forming the Switzerland, Swiss Confederation. It is composed of thirteen districts and its capital and largest city is Sion, Switzer ...
. An independent
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' ...
before, it merged on 1 January 2009 with neighboring
Ayer,
Chandolin
Chandolin is a village in the district of Sierre in the Swiss canton of Valais. An independent municipality before, it merged on 1 January 2009 with neighboring Ayer, Grimentz, Saint Jean, Saint-Luc and Vissoie to form the municipality of An ...
,
Grimentz
Grimentz is a village in the district of Sierre in the Swiss canton of Valais. An independent municipality before, it merged on 1 January 2009 with neighboring Ayer, Chandolin, Saint Jean, Saint-Luc and Vissoie to form the municipality of An ...
,
Saint Jean and
Vissoie
Vissoie is a village in the district of Sierre in the Swiss canton of Valais.
The village became an independent municipality in 1905 when it split from the municipalities of Ayer and Grimentz. However, on 1 January 2009 it merged with neighbori ...
to form the municipality of
Anniviers
Anniviers is a municipality in the district of Sierre in the canton of Valais in Switzerland. It was formed through the merger of six municipalities in Val d'Anniviers: Ayer, Chandolin, Grimentz, Saint-Jean, Saint-Luc and Vissoie. The mer ...
.
[Amtliches Gemeindeverzeichnis der Schweiz]
published by the Swiss Federal Statistical Office accessed 19 July 2011
History
Saint-Luc is first mentioned in 1267 as ''Lus''. In 1304 it was mentioned as ''Luc'', which was the official name until 1904. The name Saint-Luc first appears around 1850.
[ In 1858, the village was gutted by fire, which lead to a crucial redevelopment in the structures of the chalets.
]
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 an accurate image. The verb ''to blazon'' means to create such a description. The visual d ...
of the village 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 ...
is ''Azure, issuant from a Ribbon Or three Pine trees Vert trunked proper and an Ox passant Argent.''
Demographics
Saint-Luc has a population () of 340.[Swiss Federal Statistical Office - Superweb database - Gemeinde Statistics 1981-2008](_blank)
accessed 19 June 2010 ink not working
Ink is a gel, sol, or solution that contains at least one colorant, such as a dye or pigment, and is used to color a surface to produce an image, text, or design. Ink is used for drawing or writing with a pen, brush, reed pen, or quill. Thicke ...
/ref>
Most of the population () speaks French (265 or 83.1%) as their first language, German
German(s) may refer to:
* Germany, the country of the Germans and German things
**Germania (Roman era)
* Germans, citizens of Germany, people of German ancestry, or native speakers of the German language
** For citizenship in Germany, see also Ge ...
is the second most common (22 or 6.9%) and Portuguese is the third (16 or 5.0%). There are 8 people who speak Italian
Italian(s) may refer to:
* Anything of, from, or related to the people of Italy over the centuries
** Italians, a Romance ethnic group related to or simply a citizen of the Italian Republic or Italian Kingdom
** Italian language, a Romance languag ...
.[
Of the population in the village, 110 or about 34.5% were born in Saint-Luc and lived there in 2000. There were 87 or 27.3% who were born in the same canton, while 53 or 16.6% were born somewhere else in Switzerland, and 66 or 20.7% were born outside of Switzerland.][
, there were 135 people who were single and never married in the village. There were 154 married individuals, 16 widows or widowers and 14 individuals who are divorced.][STAT-TAB Datenwürfel für Thema 40.3 - 2000]
accessed 2 February 2011
There were 32 households that consist of only one person and 11 households with five or more people. , a total of 120 apartments (11.8% of the total) were permanently occupied, while 845 apartments (82.8%) were seasonally occupied and 55 apartments (5.4%) were empty.[Swiss Federal Statistical Office STAT-TAB - Datenwürfel für Thema 09.2 - Gebäude und Wohnungen]
accessed 28 January 2011
The historical population is given in the following chart:
Colors=
id:lightgrey value:gray(0.9)
id:darkgrey value:gray(0.8)
ImageSize = width:960 height:210
PlotArea = height:150 left:100 bottom:50 right:100
AlignBars = justify
DateFormat = x.y
Period = from:0 till:550
TimeAxis = orientation:vertical
AlignBars = justify
ScaleMajor = gridcolor:darkgrey increment:100 start:0
ScaleMinor = gridcolor:lightgrey increment:20 start:0
PlotData=
color:yellowgreen width:40 mark:(line,white) align:center
bar:1850 from:start till:385 text:"385"
bar:1860 from:start till:462 text:"462"
bar:1870 from:start till:476 text:"476"
bar:1880 from:start till:436 text:"436"
bar:1888 from:start till:549 text:"549"
bar:1900 from:start till:501 text:"501"
bar:1910 from:start till:549 text:"549"
bar:1920 from:start till:383 text:"383"
bar:1930 from:start till:377 text:"377"
bar:1941 from:start till:296 text:"296"
bar:1950 from:start till:240 text:"240"
bar:1960 from:start till:193 text:"193"
bar:1970 from:start till:168 text:"168"
bar:1980 from:start till:212 text:"212"
bar:1990 from:start till:245 text:"245"
bar:2000 from:start till:319 text:"319"
Politics
In the 2007 federal election the most popular party was the CVP which received 36.88% of the vote. The next three most popular parties were the SP (22.57%), the SVP (12.86%) and the Green Party
A green party is a formally organized political party based on the principles of green politics, such as environmentalism and social justice.
Green party platforms typically embrace Social democracy, social democratic economic policies and fo ...
(9.97%). In the federal election, a total of 176 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 is typically either the percentage of Voter registration, registered voters, Suffrage, eligible voters, or all Voti ...
was 63.8%.
Economy
There were 165 residents of the village who were employed in some capacity, of which females made up 42.4% of the workforce. the total number of full-time equivalent
Full-time equivalent (FTE), or whole time equivalent (WTE), is a unit of measurement that indicates the workload of an employed person (or student) in a way that makes workloads or class loads comparable across various contexts. FTE is often use ...
jobs was 167. The number of jobs in the primary sector was 14, of which 3 were in agriculture and 11 were in forestry or lumber production. The number of jobs in the secondary sector was 14 of which 13 or (92.9%) were in manufacturing and 1 was in construction. The number of jobs in the tertiary sector was 139. In the tertiary sector; 14 or 10.1% were in the sale or repair of motor vehicles, 17 or 12.2% were in the movement and storage of goods, 67 or 48.2% were in a hotel or restaurant, 6 or 4.3% were in education.Swiss Federal Statistical Office STAT-TAB Betriebszählung: Arbeitsstätten nach Gemeinde und NOGA 2008 (Abschnitte), Sektoren 1-3
accessed 28 January 2011
, there were 37 workers who commuted into the village and 72 workers who commuted away. The village is a net exporter of workers, with about 1.9 workers leaving the village for every one entering.[Swiss Federal Statistical Office - Statweb]
accessed 24 June 2010
Religion
From the , 269 or 84.3% were Roman Catholic
The Catholic Church (), also known as the Roman Catholic Church, is the largest Christian church, with 1.27 to 1.41 billion baptized Catholics worldwide as of 2025. It is among the world's oldest and largest international institut ...
, while 25 or 7.8% belonged to the Swiss Reformed Church
The Protestant Church in Switzerland (PCS), formerly named Federation of Swiss Protestant Churches until 31 December 2019, is a federation of 25 member churches – 24 cantonal churches and the Evangelical-Methodist Church of Switzerland. The P ...
. Of the rest of the population, there was 1 individual who belongs to another Christian church. 21 (or about 6.58% of the population) belonged to no church, are agnostic
Agnosticism is the view or belief that the existence of God, the divine, or the supernatural is either unknowable in principle or unknown in fact. (page 56 in 1967 edition) It can also mean an apathy towards such religious belief and refer to ...
or 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 3 individuals (or about 0.94% of the population) did not answer the question.[
]
Education
In Saint-Luc about 120 or (37.6%) of the population have completed non-mandatory upper secondary education, and 47 or (14.7%) have completed additional higher education (either University
A university () is an educational institution, institution of tertiary education and research which awards academic degrees in several Discipline (academia), academic disciplines. ''University'' is derived from the Latin phrase , which roughly ...
or a ''Fachhochschule
A (; plural ), abbreviated FH, is a university of applied sciences (UAS), in other words a Hochschule, German tertiary education institution that provides professional education in many applied sciences and applied arts, such as engineering, te ...
''). Of the 47 who completed tertiary schooling, 48.9% were Swiss men, 31.9% were Swiss women, 14.9% were non-Swiss men.[
, there were 67 students from Saint-Luc who attended schools outside the village.][
]
Ski Resort
Saint-Luc has a ski resort
A ski resort is a resort developed for skiing, snowboarding, and other winter sports. In Europe, most ski resorts are towns or villages in or adjacent to a ski area–a mountainous area with pistes (ski trails) and a ski lift system. In North Am ...
above, at a mean elevation of 2,200 metres. Connected with Chandolin
Chandolin is a village in the district of Sierre in the Swiss canton of Valais. An independent municipality before, it merged on 1 January 2009 with neighboring Ayer, Grimentz, Saint Jean, Saint-Luc and Vissoie to form the municipality of An ...
's ski resort, it forms the ''Saint-Luc - Chandolin Ski Domain'', with 12 ski installations (8 skilifts, 3 chairlifts, and 1 funicular), as well as 65 kilometres of ski runs. The main points of "rendez-vous" of the station are situated either at Tignousa, at an elevation of 2,180 metres, or at the Tsapé, in Chandolin side, at an elevation of 2,475 metres. The lowest and highest points of the station are at 1,680 and 2,965 metres respectively, both located on the slopes of Saint-Luc.
History
The resort started in 1959, with the ski lift Combettaz., which was subsequently replaced with a chairlift in 1964, constructed by GMD Müller. On the same occasion, it built the main lift of the station, Tignousa. Preceding these constructions, Chandolin
Chandolin is a village in the district of Sierre in the Swiss canton of Valais. An independent municipality before, it merged on 1 January 2009 with neighboring Ayer, Grimentz, Saint Jean, Saint-Luc and Vissoie to form the municipality of An ...
had already built a Poma
Poma, incorporated as Pomagalski S.A., and sometimes referred to as the Poma Group, is a French company which manufactures cable-driven lift systems, including fixed and detachable chairlifts, gondola lifts, funiculars, aerial tramways, peo ...
skilift in 1961, named Illhorn, which brought skiers from the village to the summit of the peak of the same name. In 1965, Müller built the ''Par-di-Modzes'' skilift, situated left of the Combettaz. Designated for young skiers, the skilift would be shut down in 2018. The following year, Poma built the ''Foret'' skilift, located left of the Par-di-Modzes skilift. Named after the forest it travelled through, the skilift suffered many renovations and enlargements before being replaced with a Poma chairlift in 2015. Two years later, the final Müller lift in Saint-Luc, the ''Col des Ombrintzes'', was put into service. No further constructions or renovations were effectuated until 1971, when Chandolin ordered Willy Bühler company to construct the Tsape chairlift (also known as La Remointse) and the Etables skilift. In 1973, to open access to the Bella-Tola sector, the ski lift Pas de Boeuf was put into action. With a route of over 2 kilometres long, it became the longest Poma installation in Switzerland. Apart from the renovations on the Foret skilift, Saint Luc - Chandolin waited for eight years before ordering the construction of their next installation in 1981, with the Cret de la Motte poma lift. Not a very interesting lift for skiers, it was put out of service and abandoned in 2012. The subsequent year, the Bela-Tolla skilift authorizes the access to the peak of the same name, which becomes the highest point of the resort. Although the peak's elevation is 3,025 metres, the skilift is only capable to arrive 60 metres lower. In 1985, the Ecole (literal translation of ''School'' in French) lift is put into action for young skiers of the ''Ecole Suisse de Ski de Saint-Luc'', and Saint Luc - Chandolin starts exploring a connection project between their two domains. In 1986, the Rotsé chairlift, built by Müller, permits for the first time skiers from Chandolin to access Saint-Luc by ski. To grant the return of Chandolin skiers onto Chandolin, the Col des Ombrintzes skilift is lengthened by Poma. Seven years later, in 1993, the Illhorn skilift is renovated and cut into two separate segments, as the previous lift was very difficult and especially long. The Illhorn I lift is a simply shortened version of the old lift, while Illhorn II is built from completely new materials by Poma. The following year, the Combettaz chairlift is replaced by Funiculaire St-Luc – Tignousa, a funicular built by Garaventa, which was supposed to promote "durable installations". At the same time, Poma builds a skilift, similar to the Ecole, in Chandolin, and is named Tsa. After that, no more installations were built, excluding the replacement of the Foret lift in 2015 and the shortening of the Rotse in 2020.
In popular culture
In the 1970s, an action television series called '' Skiboy'' was filmed in Saint-Luc, where actors Stephen R. Hudis
Stephen R. Hudis (born May 17, 1957) is an English actor, stunt coordinator, and director.
Career
As a child, he worked as an actor in the 1972 John Wayne film ''The Cowboys'', and starred in the 1973-1974 TV series '' Skiboy'', produced for I ...
, Margot Alexis, Robert Coleby
Robert Coleby (born 1947) is a British actor who has spent most of his career in Australia. Active since the 1970s, he has over 70 film and television credits to his name. Coleby has acted on stage in numerous productions for the Queensland The ...
, and Frederick Jaeger
Manfred Frederick Jaeger (29 May 1928 – 18 June 2004) was a German-born British film, television, theatre and radio character actor.
Biography
Jaeger was born in Berlin, Germany; his family moved to England following Adolf Hitler's rise to p ...
starred in the show. The show is about a young skier who solves crimes and mysteries in his village innocently.
References
External links
Official website
*
{{DEFAULTSORT:S Luc
Former municipalities of Valais
Villages in Switzerland
Ski areas and resorts in Switzerland
Anniviers