Pratteln (Swiss German: Brattele) is a municipality in the canton of Basel-Landschaft in Switzerland, located in the district of Liestal.

History

Pratteln is first mentioned around 1102-03 as Bratello.

Of the built up area, industrial buildings made up 10.8% of the total area while housing and buildings made up 14.9% and transportation infrastructure made up 11.7%. Power and water infrastructure as well as other special developed areas made up 2.9% of the area while parks, green belts and sports fields made up 2.9%. Out of the forested land, 25.9% of the total land area is heavily forested and 2.2% is covered with orchards or small clusters of trees. Of the agricultural land, 13.8% is used for growing crops and 10.5% is pastures, while 3.4% is used for orchards or vine crops. All the water in the municipality is flowing water.

Demographics

thumb|left|Aerial view of the Rhine, with Pratteln south of the Rhine, in the center left of the view.

Pratteln has a population () of . , 36.4% of the population are resident foreign nationals. Over the last 10 years (1997–2007) the population has changed at a rate of -0.8%.

Most of the population () speaks German (11,408 or 76.5%), with Italian being second most common (1,071 or 7.2%) and Turkish being third (581 or 3.9%). There are 184 people who speak French and 17 people who speak Romansh.

, there were 5,737 people who were single and never married in the municipality. There were 7,531 married individuals, 792 widows or widowers and 844 individuals who are divorced.

, there were 6,467 private households in the municipality, and an average of 2.2 persons per household.

there were 6,910 apartments in the municipality. The most common apartment size was 3 rooms of which there were 2,404. There were 307 single room apartments and 1,298 apartments with five or more rooms. Of these apartments, a total of 6,349 apartments (91.9% of the total) were permanently occupied, while 374 apartments (5.4%) were seasonally occupied and 187 apartments (2.7%) were empty. The vacancy rate for the municipality, , was 0.6%.

<timeline>

Colors=

id:lightgrey value:gray(0.9)

id:darkgrey value:gray(0.8)

ImageSize = width:1080 height:210

PlotArea = height:150 left:100 bottom:50 right:100

AlignBars = justify

DateFormat = x.y

Period = from:0 till:16000

TimeAxis = orientation:vertical

AlignBars = justify

ScaleMajor = gridcolor:darkgrey increment:3000 start:0

ScaleMinor = gridcolor:lightgrey increment:600 start:0

PlotData=

color:yellowgreen width:40 mark:(line,white) align:center

bar:1585 from:start till:240 text:"ca. 240"

bar:1770 from:start till:699 text:"699"

bar:1850 from:start till:1371 text:"1,371"

bar:1860 from:start till:1445 text:"1,445"

bar:1870 from:start till:1601 text:"1,601"

bar:1880 from:start till:1868 text:"1,868"

bar:1888 from:start till:1961 text:"1,961"

bar:1900 from:start till:2425 text:"2,425"

bar:1910 from:start till:3251 text:"3,251"

bar:1920 from:start till:3915 text:"3,915"

bar:1930 from:start till:4782 text:"4,782"

bar:1941 from:start till:5142 text:"5,142"

bar:1950 from:start till:6863 text:"6,863"

bar:1960 from:start till:9492 text:"9,492"

bar:1970 from:start till:15127 text:"15,127"

bar:1980 from:start till:15751 text:"15,751"

bar:1990 from:start till:15486 text:"15,486"

bar:2000 from:start till:14904 text:"14,904"

</timeline>

Sights

thumb|180px|Castle

The entire village of Pratteln is designated as part of the Inventory of Swiss Heritage Sites.

Politics

In the 2007 federal election the most popular party was the SVP which received 30.83% of the vote. The next three most popular parties were the SP (28.54%), the FDP (15.63%) and the Green Party (13.89%). In the federal election, a total of 3,612 votes were cast, and the voter turnout was 44.8%.

Economy

thumb|The Schweizer Rheinsalinen in Schweizerhalle, Pratteln

, Pratteln had an unemployment rate of 3.57%. , there were 87 people employed in the primary economic sector and about 21 businesses involved in this sector. 2,901 people were employed in the secondary sector and there were 146 businesses in this sector. 5,991 people were employed in the tertiary sector, with 543 businesses in this sector.

, there were 9,477 workers who commuted into the municipality and 5,136 workers who commuted away. The municipality is a net importer of workers, with about 1.8 workers entering the municipality for every one leaving. About 20.4% of the workforce coming into Pratteln are coming from outside Switzerland, while 0.1% of the locals commute out of Switzerland for work. Of the working population, 28.1% used public transportation to get to work, and 37.7% used a private car.

Transportation

The municipality is located on the A3 motorway.

Pratteln sits on the Bözberg and Hauenstein lines and is served by the Basel S-Bahn at Pratteln and Pratteln Salina Raurica.

Notable people

  • Ruth Chiquet-Ehrismann (1954 – 2015 in Pratteln), a biochemist and cell biologist working on interactions in the extracellular matrix
  • Max Mangold (1922 in Pratteln – 2015), a German linguist and phonetician of Swiss origin, a leading authority on the pronunciation of German
  • Werner Pfirter (1946 in Pratteln – 1973), a Swiss professional Grand Prix motorcycle road racer
  • Jörg Stohler (born 1949 in Pratteln), a former Swiss international footballer

References

  • Official website