Wichtrach

Geschichte

Wichtrach is a municipality in the Bern-Mittelland administrative district in the canton of Bern in Switzerland.HistoryWichtrach was created on 1 January 2004 by uniting the independent municipalities of Niederwichtrach and Oberwichtrach. The parish church of Oberwichtrach was first mentioned in 1180. The two Wichtrach villages were first mentioned in 1180 as Wichtracho.GeographyWichtrach has an area of. As of 2012, a total of 7.35km2 or 63.4% is used for agricultural purposes, while 2.59km2 or 22.3% is forested. Of the rest of the land, 1.52km2 or 13.1% is settled (buildings or roads), 0.11km2 or 0.9% is either rivers or lakes and 0.02km2 or 0.2% is unproductive land.During the same year, housing and buildings made up 6.9% and transportation infrastructure made up 4.4%. Out of the forested land, all of the forested land area is covered with heavy forests. Of the agricultural land, 49.9% is used for growing crops and 12.1% is pastures, while 1.5% is used for orchards or vine crops. All the water in the municipality is flowing water.On 1 January 2004 the former municipalities of Niederwichtrach and Oberwichtrach merged into the municipality of Wichtrach.On 31 December 2009 Amtsbezirk Konolfingen, the municipality's former district, was dissolved. On the following day, 1 January 2010, it joined the newly created Verwaltungskreis Bern-Mittelland.DemographicsWichtrach has a population of., 5.4% of the population are resident foreign nationals. Over the last 10 years (2001-2011) the population has changed at a rate of 0%. Migration accounted for -0.6%, while births and deaths accounted for 0.5%.