Thônex () is a municipality of the Canton of Geneva, Switzerland. It is situated in the east of the canton and shares a border with the French town of Ambilly.

History

In 1869 the municipality was created when Chêne-Thônex split into two independent municipalities Chêne-Bourg and Thônex.

Geography

thumb|left|Sierne bridge at Thônex

Thônex has an area, , of . Of this area, or 22.7% is used for agricultural purposes, while or 4.4% is forested. Of the rest of the land, or 71.4% is settled (buildings or roads), or 1.3% is either rivers or lakes.

Of the built up area, industrial buildings made up 2.3% of the total area while housing and buildings made up 53.1% and transportation infrastructure made up 11.5%. while parks, green belts and sports fields made up 3.6%. Out of the forested land, 2.3% of the total land area is heavily forested and 2.1% is covered with orchards or small clusters of trees. Of the agricultural land, 18.2% is used for growing crops and 3.1% is pastures, while 1.3% is used for orchards or vine crops. All the water in the municipality is flowing water.

Demographics

{| class="wikitable floatright" style="width: 20em"

|+ Largest groups of foreign residents 2013

|-

!Nationality || Amount || % total<br />(population)

|-

|||1,305||9.5

|-

|||665||4.8

|-

|||498||3.6

|-

|||348||2.5

|-

|||118||0.9

|-

|||104||0.8

|-

|||101||0.7

|-

|||80||0.6

|-

|||68||0.5

|-

|||61||0.4

|-

|||61||0.4

|-

|||55||0.4

|-

|||54||0.4

|-

|||48||0.3

|-

|||46||0.3

|-

|||44||0.3

|-

|||36||0.3

|-

|||35||0.2

|-

|||34||0.2

|-

|||34||0.2

|-

|}

thumb|Views of the grounds of the Clinique de Belle-Idée à Genève

thumb|l'Hôpital des Trois-Chênes

Thônex has a population () of . , 32.6% of the population are resident foreign nationals. Over the last 10 years (1999–2009 ) the population has changed at a rate of 14.6%. It has changed at a rate of 10.8% due to migration and at a rate of 3.9% due to births and deaths.

Most of the population () speaks French (9,626 or 79.3%), with German being second most common (483 or 4.0%) and Portuguese being third (474 or 3.9%). There are 405 people who speak Italian and 7 people who speak Romansh. Of the population in the municipality 1,683 or about 13.9% were born in Thônex and lived there in 2000. There were 3,364 or 27.7% who were born in the same canton, while 1,837 or 15.1% were born somewhere else in Switzerland, and 4,690 or 38.6% were born outside of Switzerland.

, there were 5,153 private households in the municipality, and an average of 2.3 persons per household.

there were 5,860 apartments in the municipality. The most common apartment size was 3 rooms of which there were 1,361. There were 1,196 single room apartments and 1,204 apartments with five or more rooms. Of these apartments, a total of 5,043 apartments (86.1% of the total) were permanently occupied, while 707 apartments (12.1%) were seasonally occupied and 110 apartments (1.9%) were empty.

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bar:1870 from:start till:532 text:"532"

bar:1880 from:start till:619 text:"619"

bar:1888 from:start till:647 text:"647"

bar:1900 from:start till:1051 text:"1,051"

bar:1910 from:start till:1252 text:"1,252"

bar:1920 from:start till:1479 text:"1,479"

bar:1930 from:start till:1504 text:"1,504"

bar:1941 from:start till:1727 text:"1,727"

bar:1950 from:start till:1953 text:"1,953"

bar:1960 from:start till:3245 text:"3,245"

bar:1970 from:start till:6680 text:"6,680"

bar:1980 from:start till:9241 text:"9,241"

bar:1990 from:start till:10180 text:"10,180"

bar:2000 from:start till:12141 text:"12,141"

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Twin Town

Thônex is twinned with Graveson, France.

Politics

Like all municipalities in the canton of Geneva, the political authorities of Thônex consist of an Administrative Council (Conseil administratif) and a Municipal Council (Conseil municipal), composed of three and twenty-seven citizens respectively, elected for four years. At the last municipal elections which took place in the spring of 2007, foreigners residing in the Canton of Geneva for eight years or more could vote.

In the 2007 federal election the most popular party was the SVP which received 24.02% of the vote. The next three most popular parties were the SP (17.6%), the LPS Party (17.51%) and the Green Party (14.06%). In the federal election, a total of 3,391 votes were cast, and the voter turnout was 49.1%.

In the 2009 Grand Conseil election, there were a total of 7,039 registered voters of which 2,932 (41.7%) voted. The most popular party in the municipality for this election was the Libéral with 21.3% of the ballots. In the canton-wide election they received the highest proportion of votes. The second most popular party was the MCG (with 17.2%), they were third in the canton-wide election, while the third most popular party was the Les Verts (with 12.9%), they were second in the canton-wide election.

For the 2009 Conseil d'Etat election, there were a total of 7,013 registered voters of which 3,376 (48.1%) voted.

, there were 4,372 workers who commuted into the municipality and 4,616 workers who commuted away. The municipality is a net exporter of workers, with about 1.1 workers leaving the municipality for every one entering. About 25.3% of the workforce coming into Thônex are coming from outside Switzerland, while 0.1% of the locals commute out of Switzerland for work. Of the working population, 29.8% used public transportation to get to work, and 50% used a private car. During that school year, there were 131 children who were in a pre-kindergarten class. The canton's school system provides two years of non-mandatory kindergarten and requires students to attend six years of primary school, with some of the children attending smaller, specialized classes. In Thônex there were 487 students in kindergarten or primary school and 50 students were in the special, smaller classes. The secondary school program consists of three lower, obligatory years of schooling, followed by three to five years of optional, advanced schools. There were 487 lower secondary students who attended school in Thônex. There were 708 upper secondary students from the municipality along with 132 students who were in a professional, non-university track program. An additional 293 students attended a private school.

, there were 431 students in Thônex who came from another municipality, while 1,022 residents attended schools outside the municipality.

  • María Corda (1898 – 1976 in Thônex) a Hungarian actress and a star of the silent film era in Germany and Austria
  • Marie José of Belgium (1906 – 2001 in Thônex) the last Queen of Italy
  • Nadège Lacroix (born 1986 in Thônex) a Swiss actress and television personality

References

  • Official Website