Schiers () is a

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 ...

village in the

Prättigau The Prättigau is a geographical region in the canton of Grisons, Switzerland. It consists of the main valley of the river Landquart and the valleys of its side-rivers and creeks. Landquart River, which drains into the Alpine Rhine in the town ...

and 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' ...

in the political district

Prättigau/Davos Region Prättigau/Davos Region is one of the eleven administrative districts in the canton of Graubünden in Switzerland Switzerland, officially the Swiss Confederation, is a landlocked country located in west-central Europe. It is bordered by ...

in the

canton Canton may refer to: Administrative divisions * Canton (administrative division), territorial/administrative division in some countries * Township (Canada), known as ''canton'' in Canadian French Arts and entertainment * Canton (band), an It ...

of Graubünden. The first concrete girder bridge ever built,

Salginatobel Bridge Salginatobel Bridge is a reinforced concrete arch bridge designed by Swiss civil engineer Robert Maillart. It was constructed across an alpine ravine in the grisonian Prättigau, belonging to the municipality of Schiers, in Switzerland between 19 ...

, is located in Schiers. Designed by

Robert Maillart Robert Maillart (16 February 1872 – 5 April 1940) was a Swiss civil engineer who revolutionized the use of structural reinforced concrete with such designs as the three-hinged arch and the deck-stiffened arch for bridges, and the beamless f ...

and completed in 1930, in 1991 it was the first concrete bridge to be designated an International Historic Civil Engineering Landmark by the

American Society of Civil Engineers The American Society of Civil Engineers (ASCE) is a tax-exempt professional body founded in 1852 to represent members of the civil engineering profession worldwide. Headquartered in Reston, Virginia, it is the oldest national engineering soci ...

History

Schiers is first mentioned in 1101 A.D. as ''Scieres''.

Geography

Schiers has an area, , of . Of this area, 36.5% is used for agricultural purposes, while 44.3% is forested. Of the rest of the land, 2.1% is settled (buildings or roads) and the remainder (17.1%) is non-productive (rivers, glaciers or mountains). Before 2017, the municipality was located in the Schiers sub-district of the Prättigau/Davos district on the border with

Austria Austria, formally the Republic of Austria, is a landlocked country in Central Europe, lying in the Eastern Alps. It is a federation of nine Federal states of Austria, states, of which the capital Vienna is the List of largest cities in Aust ...

. The highest point is the Drusenfluh at . It is located in the lower

valley at the mouth of the Schraubach. It is the center of the middle and outer Prättigau valley. It consists of the

linear village In mathematics, the term ''linear'' is used in two distinct senses for two different properties: * linearity of a '' function'' (or '' mapping''); * linearity of a ''polynomial''. An example of a linear function is the function defined by f(x)= ...

of Schiers and the

hamlet ''The Tragedy of Hamlet, Prince of Denmark'', often shortened to ''Hamlet'' (), is a Shakespearean tragedy, tragedy written by William Shakespeare sometime between 1599 and 1601. It is Shakespeare's longest play. Set in Denmark, the play (the ...

of Tersier in the valley and the settlements of Lunden, Fajauna-Stels, Maria-Montagna, Pusserein as well as Schuders on the south slope of the valley. In 1875, the hamlet of Sigg left Schiers for the municipality of

Valzeina Valzeina is a Switzerland, Swiss village in the Prättigau and a former Municipalities of Switzerland, municipality in the political district of Prättigau/Davos (district), Prättigau/Davos in the Cantons of Switzerland, canton of Graubünden. On ...

Neighbouring municipalities

Demographics

Schiers has a population (as of ) of . , 12.0% of the population was made up of foreign nationals. Over the last 10 years the population has grown at a rate of 3.2%. Most of the population () speaks German (89.6%), with Serbo-Croatian being second most common ( 2.1%) and Italian being third ( 1.6%).Swiss Federal Statistical Office
accessed 30-Oct-2009 , the gender distribution of the population was 50.2% male and 49.8% female.Graubunden in Numbers
accessed 21 September 2009 The age distribution, , in Schiers is; 339 children or 12.9% of the population are between 0 and 9 years old and 421 teenagers or 16.0% are between 10 and 19. Of the adult population, 289 people or 11.0% of the population are between 20 and 29 years old. 405 people or 15.4% are between 30 and 39, 377 people or 14.3% are between 40 and 49, and 262 people or 9.9% are between 50 and 59. The senior population distribution is 208 people or 7.9% of the population are between 60 and 69 years old, 183 people or 6.9% are between 70 and 79, there are 124 people or 4.7% who are between 80 and 89 there are 29 people or 1.1% who are between 90 and 99.Graubunden Population Statistics
accessed 21 September 2009 In the 2007 federal election, the most popular party was the SVP which received 39.1% of the vote. The next three most popular parties were the FDP (32.4%), the SP (20.4%) and the local, small right-wing parties (4.4%). In Schiers about 66.5% of the population (between age 25-64) have completed either non-mandatory

upper secondary education Secondary education is the education level following primary education and preceding tertiary education. Level 2 or ''lower secondary education'' (less commonly ''junior secondary education'') is considered the second and final phase of basic e ...

or additional higher education (either university 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 ...

''). Schiers has an unemployment rate of 1%. , there were 130 people employed in the primary economic sector and about 56 businesses involved in this sector. 333 people are 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 constructi ...

and there are 29 businesses in this sector. 850 people are 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 ...

, with 87 businesses in this sector. From the , 389 or 14.8% are

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 1,755 or 66.6% 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 are fewer than five individuals who belong to the Christian Catholic faith; there are 28 individuals (or about 1.06% of the population) who belong to the Orthodox Church; and there are 58 individuals (or about 2.20% of the population) who belong to another Christian church. There are 135 (or about 5.12% of the population) who are

Islam Islam is an Abrahamic religions, Abrahamic monotheistic religion based on the Quran, and the teachings of Muhammad. Adherents of Islam are called Muslims, who are estimated to number Islam by country, 2 billion worldwide and are the world ...

ic. There are 36 individuals (or about 1.37% of the population) who belong to another church (not listed on the census), 149 (or about 5.65% of the population) belong 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 ...

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 87 individuals (or about 3.30% of the population) did not answer the question. The historical population is given in the following table:

Heritage sites of national significance

The

is listed as a Swiss heritage site of national significance. The Salginatobel Bridge is a

reinforced concrete Reinforced concrete, also called ferroconcrete or ferro-concrete, is a composite material in which concrete's relatively low tensile strength and ductility are compensated for by the inclusion of reinforcement having higher tensile strength or ...

arch An arch is a curved vertical structure spanning an open space underneath it. Arches may support the load above them, or they may perform a purely decorative role. As a decorative element, the arch dates back to the 4th millennium BC, but stru ...

bridge A bridge is a structure built to Span (engineering), span a physical obstacle (such as a body of water, valley, road, or railway) without blocking the path underneath. It is constructed for the purpose of providing passage over the obstacle, whi ...

civil engineer A civil engineer is a person who practices civil engineering – the application of planning, designing, constructing, maintaining, and operating infrastructure while protecting the public and environmental health, as well as improving existing i ...

. It was constructed across an alpine valley in Schiers between 1929 and 1930. In 1991, it was declared an International Historic Civil Engineering Landmark, the thirteenth such structure and the first concrete bridge so dedicated.Billington, David P. ''The Art of Structural Design: A Swiss Legacy.''

Princeton University Art Museum The Princeton University Art Museum (PUAM) is the Princeton University gallery of art, located in Princeton, New Jersey. With a collecting history that began in 1755, the museum was formally established in 1882, and now houses over 117,000 work ...

. Princeton, USA, 2003. , p.60 As with Maillart's Schwandbach Bridge and

Vessy Bridge Vessy may refer to: People * Robert Vessy (died 1430), English politician and Member of Parliament Places * Vessy, a locality within the municipality of Veyrier in the Canton of Geneva, Switzerland See also *Vess * Vessey (disambiguation) *Vesy * ...

, the structure's fame among civil engineers is a consequence of the techniques involved and the elegance of its design rather than its prominent location: it serves a town of under a thousand people. File:Salgina schemat.svg, Salginatobel Bridge File:Salginatobel Bridge mg 4077.jpg, The bridge File:Salginatobel Bridge mg 4055.jpg, Concrete arch under the bridge File:Salginatobel Bridge mg 4065.jpg, View from the bridge into the canyon

Transportation

The municipality has a railway station, , on the Landquart–Davos Platz line. It has regular service to , , , , and .

References

External links

Municipality website
{{Authority control Municipalities of Graubünden Cultural property of national significance in Graubünden