Spreading: Soil is distributed in Switzerland

Soil is distributed in Switzerland – 5 graphics for the Sprawl Initiative

What is the region for in Switzerland? What is the size of the construction zones? And what should be done to make room for new buildings and streets? With our graphics, you know, before February 10, the initiative of the Zersiedelungs is voted.

This is how the Swiss space is divided

Switzerland is 41,284 km away² great. The use of this area is regularly studied by the Federal Statistical Office. The latest figures, available in their entirety, date from 2009. The non-productive areas represent a quarter of the area of ​​Switzerland. These include water, rocks and rocks or glaciers. A rare third of Switzerland occupies an optimal surface, so it consists of forests and bush forests or woody plants. Nearly 36% of the land is used as agricultural land.

The remaining 7.5%, or 3,077 km², is used as a settlement area. There are residential and commercial buildings, schools, factories, streets and railways, but also green spaces such as gardens, parks or football fields. Construction areas – including unused areas – are part of the settlement area.

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So, the settlement area has changed

The population and the settlement area have increased steadily in Switzerland since 1985 and continue to do so. Until 2009, the per capita space had reached the previous maximum of 407 m² per capita. Since then, according to Watson's projections, this value has fallen to 384 m² per capita.

There are still missing new figures across Switzerland. For the most recent regional statistics (survey period from 2013 to 2018), not all cantons have received data yet. Of the five missing cantons (Glarus, St. Gallen, Graubünden, Ticino and Valais), Watson therefore used the figures from the last survey (2004-2009) and the population figures for the year 2009.

This land was to give way to the new settlement area

Between the first survey in 1985 and the last complete figures in 2009, the 2207 km settlement area² at 3079 km² at. This corresponds to an increase of 23.4%. In absolute value, it is 872 km² – one and a half times the size of Lake Geneva.

This new settlement area was created mainly, about 90%, on old farmland: one-third each on natural grasslands and farmland and, to a lesser extent, on orchards, gardens. and vineyards, as well as pastures and alpine growing areas.

Here are the construction zones in Switzerland

Construction zones are at the heart of the Zersiedelungs initiative. The initiators want to freeze their total surface at the current level. This means that in the future, only new construction zones can be created if, elsewhere, an equal area is delimited.

Note: You must zoom in on the map. The construction zones then become visible:

According to the 2017 Construction Zone statistics, the total area of ​​construction areas was 2286 km nationwide²This corresponds to 5% of the total area of ​​Switzerland. Construction zones increased by 1.5% or 34 km between 2012 and 2017² at. However, this growth is partly due to a change in survey methodology. 95% of Swiss residents live in a construction zone. Per capita construction area decreased during this 309-meter period² at 291m²,

These cantons have the most undeveloped building plots

If the urban sprawl initiative is adopted, still unbuilt construction areas will be even more important for future spatial planning than before. As it is unlikely that new construction areas will be built, construction activities will focus heavily on these unused areas. Or they would be zoned in exchange for creating new construction zones elsewhere.

Unconstruction construction zones are determined by an analysis of the maps and data of the construction register. However, this does not always make it possible to accurately take into account the local peculiarities as well as the regulations in terms of planning and construction. Therefore, the analysis is calculated using two assumptions and the results are reported as fuzzy bandwidths.

The share of non-built construction areas in 2017 was between 11 and 17%. This corresponds to an area of ​​between 257 km2 and 405 km2. The latter corresponds to about half the area of ​​the canton of Schaffhausen. The least developed construction zones are located in the canton of Valais. They are between 37.3 km2 and 57 km2. This corresponds to a share of up to 22% in the construction zone.