Arth is a municipality

Municipalities of Switzerland

Communes , also known as municipalities, are the smallest government division in Switzerland, numbering 2,596 . While many have a population of a few hundred citizens, the largest cities such as Zürich or Geneva also have the legal status of municipalities...

 in Schwyz District in the canton of Schwyz

Canton of Schwyz

Schwyz is a canton in central Switzerland between the Alps in the south, Lake Lucerne in the east and Lake Zurich in the north, centered around and named after the town of Schwyz....

 in Switzerland

Switzerland

Switzerland name of one of the Swiss cantons. ; ; ; or ), in its full name the Swiss Confederation , is a federal republic consisting of 26 cantons, with Bern as the seat of the federal authorities. The country is situated in Western Europe,Or Central Europe depending on the definition....

.

Geography

Arth has an area, , of 42.1 km² (16.3 sq mi). Of this area, 40.8% is used for agricultural purposes, while 46.3% is forested. Of the rest of the land, 8.5% is settled (buildings or roads) and the remainder (4.3%) is non-productive (rivers, glaciers or mountains).

The municipality is situated on the southern shore of Lake Zug, and along the Gotthard route between Rigi

Rigi

- Mt. Rigi in Art:Mt. Rigi has been featured in many works of art, including both paintings and literary publications. Perhaps the most famous paintings of the Rigi were by JMW Turner, including "The Blue Rigi, Lake of Lucerne, Sunrise"...

 and Rossberg. It consists of the villages of Arth Oberarth and Goldau

Goldau

Goldau is a city in the community of Arth, canton of Schwyz, Switzerland. It lies between two mountains, the Rigi and the Rossberg...

 as well as the hamlets

Hamlet (place)

A hamlet is usually a rural settlement which is too small to be considered a village, though sometimes the word is used for a different sort of community. Historically, when a hamlet became large enough to justify building a church, it was then classified as a village...

 of Klösterli and Kulm an der Rigi.

Demographics

Arth has a population (as of ) of . , 23.6% of the population was made up of foreign nationals. Over the last 10 years the population has grown at a rate of 6.3%. Most of the population speaks German (86.9%), with Albanian being second most common ( 3.9%) and Serbo-Croatian being third ( 3.2%).

the gender distribution of the population was 50.3% male and 49.7% female. The age distribution, , in Arth is; 2,555 people or 26.6% of the population is between 0 and 19. 2,870 people or 29.9% are 20 to 39, and 2,832 people or 29.5% are 40 to 64. The senior population distribution is 734 people or 7.7% are 65 to 74. There are 467 people or 4.9% who are 70 to 79 and 135 people or 1.41% of the population who are over 80. There is one person in Arth who is over 100 years old.

there are 3,806 households, of which 1,156 households (or about 30.4%) contain only a single individual. 275 or about 7.2% are large households, with at least five members.

In the 2007 election the most popular party was the SVP

Swiss People's Party

The Swiss People's Party , also known as the Democratic Union of the Centre , is a conservative political party in Switzerland. Chaired by Toni Brunner, but spearheaded by Christoph Blocher, the party is the largest party in the Federal Assembly, with 58 members of the National Council and 6 of...

 which received 38.8% of the vote. The next three most popular parties were the CVP

Christian Democratic People's Party of Switzerland

The Christian Democratic People's Party of Switzerland is a Christian democratic political party in Switzerland. It is the fourth-largest party in the National Council, with 31 seats, and the largest in the Council of States, with 15 seats. It has one seat, that of Doris Leuthard, on the Swiss...

 (20.8%), the FDP

Free Democratic Party of Switzerland

The Free Democratic Party was a classical liberal political party in Switzerland. It was one of the major parties in Switzerland until its merger with the smaller classical liberal Liberal Party, to form FDP.The Liberals on 1 January 2009....

 (20.4%) and the SPS

Social Democratic Party of Switzerland

The Social Democratic Party of Switzerland is the largest centre-left political party in Switzerland....

 (16.3%).

The entire Swiss population is generally well educated. In Arth about 63.6% of the population (between age 25-64) have completed either non-mandatory upper secondary education or additional higher education (either University or a Fachhochschule

Fachhochschule

A Fachhochschule or University of Applied Sciences is a German type of tertiary education institution, sometimes specialized in certain topical areas . Fachhochschulen were founded in Germany and later adopted by Austria, Liechtenstein, Switzerland and Greece...

).

Arth has an unemployment rate of 1.55%. , there were 329 people employed in the primary economic sector and about 129 businesses involved in this sector. 810 people are employed in the secondary sector and there are 88 businesses in this sector. 1868 people are employed in the tertiary sector, with 302 businesses in this sector.

From the , 6,927 or 72.2% are Roman Catholic, while 939 or 9.8% belonged to the Swiss Reformed Church

Swiss Reformed Church

The Reformed branch of Protestantism in Switzerland was started in Zürich by Huldrych Zwingli and spread within a few years to Basel , Bern , St...

. Of the rest of the population, there are less than 5 individuals who belong to the Christian Catholic

Christian Catholic Church of Switzerland

The Christian Catholic Church of Switzerland is the Swiss member church of the Union of Utrecht, also known as Old Catholic Church, originally founded by the jansenists, with a later influx of discontented Catholics following their disappointment with the First Vatican Council. It has 14,000...

 faith, there are 273 individuals (or about 2.85% of the population) who belong to the Orthodox Church, and there are 7 individuals (or about 0.07% of the population) who belong to another Christian church. There are less than 5 individuals who are Jewish

Judaism

Judaism ) is the "religion, philosophy, and way of life" of the Jewish people...

, and 717 (or about 7.47% of the population) who are Islam

Islam

Islam . The most common are and .   : Arabic pronunciation varies regionally. The first vowel ranges from ~~. The second vowel ranges from ~~~...

ic. There are 84 individuals (or about 0.88% of the population) who belong to another church (not listed on the census), 337 (or about 3.51% of the population) belong to no church, are agnostic

Agnosticism

Agnosticism is the view that the truth value of certain claims—especially claims about the existence or non-existence of any deity, but also other religious and metaphysical claims—is unknown or unknowable....

 or atheist

Atheism

Atheism is, in a broad sense, the rejection of belief in the existence of deities. In a narrower sense, atheism is specifically the position that there are no deities...

, and 302 individuals (or about 3.15% of the population) did not answer the question.

The historical population is given in the following table:

year	population
1743	2,134
1850	2,196
1900	4,739
1950	5,816
2000	9,593
2005	9,918
2007	10,227

Transport

The railway station at Goldau, named Arth-Goldau

Arth-Goldau railway station

Arth-Goldau railway station is a railway junction in Arth, in the district and canton of Schwyz, Switzerland.The station is located in the centre of the village of Goldau, which forms part of Arth....

, is an important junction of the Swiss Federal Railways

SBB-CFF-FFS

Swiss Federal Railways and SFR are not in official use) is the national railway company of Switzerland headquartered in Bern. Formerly a government institution, it is since 1999 a special stock corporation with all shares held by the Swiss Confederation or the Swiss cantons...

. The Voralpen Express

Voralpen Express

The Voralpen-Express is a named train connecting medium sized cities in central and eastern Switzerland in operation since 1991. It is jointly operated by Südostbahn and the Swiss Federal Railways ....

 train connects here to Luzern and St. Gallen

St. Gallen

St. Gallen is the capital of the canton of St. Gallen in Switzerland. It evolved from the hermitage of Saint Gall, founded in the 7th century. Today, it is a large urban agglomeration and represents the center of eastern Switzerland. The town mainly relies on the service sector for its economic...

. Meanwhile, trains to Bellinzona

Bellinzona

Bellinzona is the administrative capital of the canton Ticino in Switzerland. The city is famous for its three castles that have been UNESCO World Heritage Sites since 2000....

, Lugano

Lugano

Lugano is a city of inhabitants in the city proper and a total of over 145,000 people in the agglomeration/city region, in the south of Switzerland, in the Italian-speaking canton of Ticino, which borders Italy...

 and Italy

Italy

Italy , officially the Italian Republic languages]] under the European Charter for Regional or Minority Languages. In each of these, Italy's official name is as follows:;;;;;;;;), is a unitary parliamentary republic in South-Central Europe. To the north it borders France, Switzerland, Austria and...

, as well as trains to Zug

Zug

Zug , is a German-speaking city in Switzerland. The name ‘Zug’ originates from fishing vocabulary; in the Middle Ages it referred to the right to ‘pull up’ fishing nets and hence to the right to fish.The city of Zug is located in the Canton of Zug and is its capital...

 and Zürich

Zürich

Zurich is the largest city in Switzerland and the capital of the canton of Zurich. It is located in central Switzerland at the northwestern tip of Lake Zurich...

 join here with trains heading toward Basel

Basel

Basel or Basle In the national languages of Switzerland the city is also known as Bâle , Basilea and Basilea is Switzerland's third most populous city with about 166,000 inhabitants. Located where the Swiss, French and German borders meet, Basel also has suburbs in France and Germany...

.