Les Brenets
Encyclopedia
Les Brenets is a municipality
in the district of Le Locle in the canton
of Neuchâtel in Switzerland
.
Les Brenets has an area, , of 11.5 square kilometre. Of this area, 4.73 square kilometre or 41.0% is used for agricultural purposes, while 5.64 square kilometre or 48.9% is forested. Of the rest of the land, 0.72 square kilometre or 6.2% is settled (buildings or roads), 0.43 square kilometre or 3.7% is either rivers or lakes and 0.04 km² (9.9 acre) or 0.3% is unproductive land.
Of the built up area, housing and buildings made up 3.4% and transportation infrastructure made up 1.8%. Out of the forested land, 44.1% of the total land area is heavily forested and 4.9% is covered with orchards or small clusters of trees. Of the agricultural land, 0.6% is used for growing crops and 25.5% is pastures and 14.7% is used for alpine pastures. Of the water in the municipality, 3.5% is in lakes and 0.3% is in rivers and streams.
The municipality is located in the Le Locle, on the northwestern slope of the Jura Mountains
. The Doubs river in the municipality forms the French
border.
Lac des Brenets
on Doubs River
is located in the municipality.
of the municipal coat of arms
is Per fess by a bar chequy Or and Sable, in chief Gules a Chevron raised Argent, and in base Azure, a Waterfall falling from mountains with Pinetrees Vert. The waterfall is the Doubs Falls on the river Doubs between France
and Switzerland.
Most of the population speaks French
(1,106 or 95.0%) as their first language, German
is the second most common (23 or 2.0%) and Italian
is the third (18 or 1.5%).
, the population was 48.9% male and 51.1% female. The population was made up of 473 Swiss men (43.4% of the population) and 59 (5.4%) non-Swiss men. There were 499 Swiss women (45.8%) and 58 (5.3%) non-Swiss women. Of the population in the municipality, 342 or about 29.4% were born in Les Brenets and lived there in 2000. There were 382 or 32.8% who were born in the same canton, while 189 or 16.2% were born somewhere else in Switzerland, and 213 or 18.3% were born outside of Switzerland.
, children and teenagers (0-19 years old) make up 23.4% of the population, while adults (20-64 years old) make up 59.4% and seniors (over 64 years old) make up 17.3%.
, there were 416 people who were single and never married in the municipality. There were 584 married individuals, 81 widows or widowers and 83 individuals who are divorced.
, there were 482 private households in the municipality, and an average of 2.3 persons per household. There were 142 households that consist of only one person and 32 households with five or more people. , a total of 461 apartments (84.1% of the total) were permanently occupied, while 56 apartments (10.2%) were seasonally occupied and 31 apartments (5.7%) were empty. The vacancy rate for the municipality, , was 5.47%.
The historical population is given in the following chart:
the most popular party was the SP
which received 24.03% of the vote. The next three most popular parties were the SVP
(22.07%), the LPS Party
(18.76%) and the PdA Party (15.91%). In the federal election, a total of 446 votes were cast, and the voter turnout
was 53.6%.
the total number of full-time equivalent
jobs was 843. The number of jobs in the primary sector was 29, all of which were in agriculture. The number of jobs in the secondary sector was 706 of which 697 or (98.7%) were in manufacturing and 4 (0.6%) were in construction. The number of jobs in the tertiary sector was 108. In the tertiary sector; 36 or 33.3% were in the sale or repair of motor vehicles, 10 or 9.3% were in the movement and storage of goods, 18 or 16.7% were in a hotel or restaurant, 2 or 1.9% were the insurance or financial industry, 2 or 1.9% were technical professionals or scientists, 5 or 4.6% were in education and 30 or 27.8% were in health care.
, there were 867 workers who commuted into the municipality and 349 workers who commuted away. The municipality is a net importer of workers, with about 2.5 workers entering the municipality for every one leaving. About 43.1% of the workforce coming into Les Brenets are coming from outside Switzerland, while 0.0% of the locals commute out of Switzerland for work. Of the working population, 8.5% used public transportation to get to work, and 62% used a private car.
. Of the rest of the population, there were 2 members of an Orthodox church
(or about 0.17% of the population), there were 2 individuals (or about 0.17% of the population) who belonged to the Christian Catholic Church
, and there were 39 individuals (or about 3.35% of the population) who belonged to another Christian church. There were 10 (or about 0.86% of the population) who were Islam
ic. There was 1 person who was Buddhist
and 2 individuals who belonged to another church. 204 (or about 17.53% of the population) belonged to no church, are agnostic
or atheist
, and 54 individuals (or about 4.64% of the population) did not answer the question.
). Of the 113 who completed tertiary schooling, 59.3% were Swiss men, 25.7% were Swiss women, 8.8% were non-Swiss men and 6.2% were non-Swiss women.
In the canton of Neuchâtel most municipalities provide two years of non-mandatory kindergarten
, followed by five years of mandatory primary education. The next four years of mandatory secondary education is provided at thirteen larger secondary schools, which many students travel out of their home municipality to attend. During the 2010-11 school year, there was one kindergarten class with a total of 23 students in Les Brenets. In the same year, there were 3 primary classes with a total of 60 students.
, there were 2 students in Les Brenets who came from another municipality, while 113 residents attended schools outside the 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 the district of Le Locle in the canton
Cantons of Switzerland
The 26 cantons of Switzerland are the member states of the federal state of Switzerland. Each canton was a fully sovereign state with its own borders, army and currency from the Treaty of Westphalia until the establishment of the Swiss federal state in 1848...
of Neuchâtel 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
Of the built up area, housing and buildings made up 3.4% and transportation infrastructure made up 1.8%. Out of the forested land, 44.1% of the total land area is heavily forested and 4.9% is covered with orchards or small clusters of trees. Of the agricultural land, 0.6% is used for growing crops and 25.5% is pastures and 14.7% is used for alpine pastures. Of the water in the municipality, 3.5% is in lakes and 0.3% is in rivers and streams.
The municipality is located in the Le Locle, on the northwestern slope of the Jura Mountains
Jura mountains
The Jura Mountains are a small mountain range located north of the Alps, separating the Rhine and Rhone rivers and forming part of the watershed of each...
. The Doubs river in the municipality forms the French
France
The French Republic , The French Republic , The French Republic , (commonly known as France , is a unitary semi-presidential republic in Western Europe with several overseas territories and islands located on other continents and in the Indian, Pacific, and Atlantic oceans. Metropolitan France...
border.
Lac des Brenets
Lac des Brenets
Lac des Brenets or Lac de Chaillexon is a lake on the Doubs River on the border of Switzerland and France.-External links:* at Les Brenets...
on Doubs River
Doubs River
The Doubs is a 453 km long river in eastern France and western Switzerland, left tributary of the Saône. Its source is near Mouthe in the western Jura mountains....
is located in the municipality.
Coat of arms
The blazonBlazon
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 the appropriate image...
of the municipal coat of arms
Coat of arms
A coat of arms is a unique heraldic design on a shield or escutcheon or on a surcoat or tabard used to cover and protect armour and to identify the wearer. Thus the term is often stated as "coat-armour", because it was anciently displayed on the front of a coat of cloth...
is Per fess by a bar chequy Or and Sable, in chief Gules a Chevron raised Argent, and in base Azure, a Waterfall falling from mountains with Pinetrees Vert. The waterfall is the Doubs Falls on the river Doubs between France
France
The French Republic , The French Republic , The French Republic , (commonly known as France , is a unitary semi-presidential republic in Western Europe with several overseas territories and islands located on other continents and in the Indian, Pacific, and Atlantic oceans. Metropolitan France...
and Switzerland.
Demographics
Les Brenets has a population of . , 11.6% of the population are resident foreign nationals. Over the last 10 years (2000–2010 ) the population has changed at a rate of -7.9%. It has changed at a rate of -7.2% due to migration and at a rate of 0.3% due to births and deaths.Most of the population speaks French
French language
French is a Romance language spoken as a first language in France, the Romandy region in Switzerland, Wallonia and Brussels in Belgium, Monaco, the regions of Quebec and Acadia in Canada, and by various communities elsewhere. Second-language speakers of French are distributed throughout many parts...
(1,106 or 95.0%) as their first language, German
German language
German is a West Germanic language, related to and classified alongside English and Dutch. With an estimated 90 – 98 million native speakers, German is one of the world's major languages and is the most widely-spoken first language in the European Union....
is the second most common (23 or 2.0%) and Italian
Italian language
Italian is a Romance language spoken mainly in Europe: Italy, Switzerland, San Marino, Vatican City, by minorities in Malta, Monaco, Croatia, Slovenia, France, Libya, Eritrea, and Somalia, and by immigrant communities in the Americas and Australia...
is the third (18 or 1.5%).
, the population was 48.9% male and 51.1% female. The population was made up of 473 Swiss men (43.4% of the population) and 59 (5.4%) non-Swiss men. There were 499 Swiss women (45.8%) and 58 (5.3%) non-Swiss women. Of the population in the municipality, 342 or about 29.4% were born in Les Brenets and lived there in 2000. There were 382 or 32.8% who were born in the same canton, while 189 or 16.2% were born somewhere else in Switzerland, and 213 or 18.3% were born outside of Switzerland.
, children and teenagers (0-19 years old) make up 23.4% of the population, while adults (20-64 years old) make up 59.4% and seniors (over 64 years old) make up 17.3%.
, there were 416 people who were single and never married in the municipality. There were 584 married individuals, 81 widows or widowers and 83 individuals who are divorced.
, there were 482 private households in the municipality, and an average of 2.3 persons per household. There were 142 households that consist of only one person and 32 households with five or more people. , a total of 461 apartments (84.1% of the total) were permanently occupied, while 56 apartments (10.2%) were seasonally occupied and 31 apartments (5.7%) were empty. The vacancy rate for the municipality, , was 5.47%.
The historical population is given in the following chart:
Sights
The entire village of Les Brenets is designated as part of the Inventory of Swiss Heritage SitesInventory of Swiss Heritage Sites
The Inventory of Swiss Heritage Sites is part of a 1981 Ordinance of the Swiss Federal Council implementing the Federal Law on the Protection of Nature and Cultural Heritage.-Sites of national importance:-Types:...
Politics
In the 2007 federal electionSwiss federal election, 2007
Elections to the Swiss Federal Assembly, the federal parliament of Switzerland, were held on Sunday, 21 October 2007. In a few cantons, a second round of the elections to the Council of States was held on 11 November, 18 November, and 25 November 2007...
the most popular party was the SP
Social Democratic Party of Switzerland
The Social Democratic Party of Switzerland is the largest centre-left political party in Switzerland....
which received 24.03% of the vote. The next three most popular parties were 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...
(22.07%), the LPS Party
Liberal Party of Switzerland
The Liberal Party of Switzerland was a party with economically liberal policies. It was known as a party of the upper class. On 1 January 2009 it merged with the larger Free Democratic Party to establish FDP.The Liberals....
(18.76%) and the PdA Party (15.91%). In the federal election, a total of 446 votes were cast, and the voter turnout
Voter turnout
Voter turnout is the percentage of eligible voters who cast a ballot in an election . After increasing for many decades, there has been a trend of decreasing voter turnout in most established democracies since the 1960s...
was 53.6%.
Economy
, Les Brenets had an unemployment rate of 5.2%. , there were 39 people employed in the primary economic sector and about 17 businesses involved in this sector. 749 people were employed in the secondary sector and there were 24 businesses in this sector. 141 people were employed in the tertiary sector, with 31 businesses in this sector. There were 574 residents of the municipality who were employed in some capacity, of which females made up 45.8% of the workforce.the total number of full-time equivalent
Full-time equivalent
Full-time equivalent , is a unit to measure employed persons or students in a way that makes them comparable although they may work or study a different number of hours per week. FTE is often used to measure a worker's involvement in a project, or to track cost reductions in an organization...
jobs was 843. The number of jobs in the primary sector was 29, all of which were in agriculture. The number of jobs in the secondary sector was 706 of which 697 or (98.7%) were in manufacturing and 4 (0.6%) were in construction. The number of jobs in the tertiary sector was 108. In the tertiary sector; 36 or 33.3% were in the sale or repair of motor vehicles, 10 or 9.3% were in the movement and storage of goods, 18 or 16.7% were in a hotel or restaurant, 2 or 1.9% were the insurance or financial industry, 2 or 1.9% were technical professionals or scientists, 5 or 4.6% were in education and 30 or 27.8% were in health care.
, there were 867 workers who commuted into the municipality and 349 workers who commuted away. The municipality is a net importer of workers, with about 2.5 workers entering the municipality for every one leaving. About 43.1% of the workforce coming into Les Brenets are coming from outside Switzerland, while 0.0% of the locals commute out of Switzerland for work. Of the working population, 8.5% used public transportation to get to work, and 62% used a private car.
Religion
From the , 394 or 33.8% were Roman Catholic, while 475 or 40.8% belonged to the Swiss Reformed ChurchSwiss 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 were 2 members of an Orthodox church
Orthodox Christianity
The term Orthodox Christianity may refer to:* the Eastern Orthodox Church and its various geographical subdivisions...
(or about 0.17% of the population), there were 2 individuals (or about 0.17% of the population) who belonged to the Christian Catholic Church
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...
, and there were 39 individuals (or about 3.35% of the population) who belonged to another Christian church. There were 10 (or about 0.86% of the population) who were Islam
Islam
Islam . The most common are and . : Arabic pronunciation varies regionally. The first vowel ranges from ~~. The second vowel ranges from ~~~...
ic. There was 1 person who was Buddhist
Buddhism
Buddhism is a religion and philosophy encompassing a variety of traditions, beliefs and practices, largely based on teachings attributed to Siddhartha Gautama, commonly known as the Buddha . The Buddha lived and taught in the northeastern Indian subcontinent some time between the 6th and 4th...
and 2 individuals who belonged to another church. 204 (or about 17.53% of the population) belonged 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 54 individuals (or about 4.64% of the population) did not answer the question.
Education
In Les Brenets about 461 or (39.6%) of the population have completed non-mandatory upper secondary education, and 113 or (9.7%) have completed additional higher education (either university or a FachhochschuleFachhochschule
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...
). Of the 113 who completed tertiary schooling, 59.3% were Swiss men, 25.7% were Swiss women, 8.8% were non-Swiss men and 6.2% were non-Swiss women.
In the canton of Neuchâtel most municipalities provide two years of non-mandatory kindergarten
Kindergarten
A kindergarten is a preschool educational institution for children. The term was created by Friedrich Fröbel for the play and activity institute that he created in 1837 in Bad Blankenburg as a social experience for children for their transition from home to school...
, followed by five years of mandatory primary education. The next four years of mandatory secondary education is provided at thirteen larger secondary schools, which many students travel out of their home municipality to attend. During the 2010-11 school year, there was one kindergarten class with a total of 23 students in Les Brenets. In the same year, there were 3 primary classes with a total of 60 students.
, there were 2 students in Les Brenets who came from another municipality, while 113 residents attended schools outside the municipality.