Vorarlberg - encyclopedia article about Vorarlberg.

**Vorarlberg**

State	AT-8 ()
Capital	Bregenz
Governor	Herbert Sausgruber (ÖVP)
Area - Total	Ranked 8th 2,601 km
Population - Total (2001) - Density	Ranked 8th 372,791 143/km
The state flag of Vorarlberg
The state of Vorarlberg on the map of Austria

Vorarlberg is the westernmost state (Land) of Austria. Though it is the second smallest in terms of area (Vienna is the smallest), it borders three countries:

as well as the Austrian state of Tyrol.

The capital of Vorarlberg is

Bregenz, which also is one of the five cities.

The other four are:

The main rivers in Vorarlberg are the Ill (running through the Montafon and Walgau valleys into the Rhine), the Rhine (forming the border to Switzerland), the Bregenzer Ach and the Dornbirner Ach. Important lakes, other than the Lake of Constance are Lüner Lake, Silvretta Lake, Vermunt Lake, Spuller Lake, the Kops Basin and Formarin Lake; the first four were created for the production of hydroelectric energy. Even before the dam for the power plant was built, Lüner Lake was the largest mountain lake in the Alps. Most of this hydroelectric energy is exported to Germany at peak times. At night the surplus (and therefore cheap) energy from the caloric power plants in Germany is used to pump the water back into some of the lakes.

As there are several notable mountain ranges in Vorarlberg, such as the Silvretta, the Rätikon, the Verwall and the Arlberg, there are many famous skiing regions. The highest mountain is Piz Buin, whose rocky peak of 3,312 meters is surrounded by glaciers. Vorarlberg is supposed to enjoy the greatest scenic diversity within limited confines in the entire East Alps at the border to the West Alps. The distance between Lake Constance and the plains of the Rhine valley across medium-altitude and high-alpine zones to the glaciers of the Silvretta range is a mere 90 km. Vorarlberg is divided into four large districts, from north to south: Bregenz, Dornbirn, Feldkirch and Bludenz. These districts appear on the automobile license plates in the form of abbreviations: B, DO, FK and BZ.

Economy

For several years, the Vorarlberg economy has been performing well above the Austrian average. Whereas the all-Austrian GDP in 2004 rose by a "mere" 2.0% in real terms, Vorarlberg recorded an increase of 2.9%. This comes as a surprise, particularly as the major trading partners in Germany, Switzerland and Italy have not been faring well. Owing to this robust economic performance, Vorarlberg was able to boost its gross regional product in 2004 to 11.5 billion EUR according to calculations by the Economic Policy Department of the Vorarlberg Chamber of Trade. This translates into a nominal increase of 5.0% (Austria as a whole +4.0%). The regional product per inhabitant in Vorarlberg is 31,000 EUR, exceeding the Austrian national average by 8%. In addition to the flourishing textile, clothing, electronics, machinery, packing materials industries of the Rhine Valley, there is also a broad agricultural base, especially in the Bregenzerwald, which is noted for its dairy products ("Bregenzerwälder Cheese Route" and tourism. The tourist industry employs a considerable number of Vorarlbergers. The greatest tourist attractions are the mountains and the numerous ski resorts, the largest (and most famous) of which are:

the Bregenzerwald,
the Arlberg region (including the high-class ski resorts Lech and Zürs),
the Brandnertal, and
the Montafon.

Some famous skiers from these regions include Anita Wachter, Egon Zimmermann, Gerhard Nenning, Mario Reiter, Toni Innauer and Hannes Schneider.

Religion

78 % of the population is Roman Catholic, which puts Vorarlberg in line with all-Austrian average (73.6%), 7,817 Vorarlberg inhabitants are Protestant (2.2 %). The second largest religious denomination is Islam which accounts for a share of 8.4 % (mainly Turkish immigrants).

Language

Due to their isolated location from the rest of Austria, the most of the people in Vorarlberg speak a very distinct German dialect which other Austrians have a hard time understanding. It is in some way similar to the German dialects spoken in Switzerland, Liechtenstein, Baden-Württemberg and the Alsace region in France (they are all Alemannic dialects, whereas the dialects in the rest of Austria form part of the Bavarian-Austrian language group). In fact many towns or even villages in Vorarlberg have their own distinct sub-dialects.

Districts of Vorarlberg. Clockwise from north: Bregenz, Bludenz, Feldkirch, Dornbirn

History

Vorarlberg was a part of Further Austria, and parts of the area were ruled by the Counts Montfort of Vorarlberg. Following World War I there was a desire by many in Voralberg to join Switzerland.^[1] In a referendum held in Vorarlberg on 11 May 1919 over 80% of those voting supported a proposal that the state should join the Swiss Confederation. However, this was prevented by the opposition of the Austrian Government, the Allies, Swiss liberals, the Swiss-Italians and the Swiss-French.^[2]

Notes

1. ^ 1982 Britanica, article on History of Austria
2. ^ [1]

External links

• • [ e] States of Austria
Burgenland Carinthia Lower Austria Salzburg Styria Tyrol Upper Austria Vienna Vorarlberg

[ edit ]	Districts (Bezirke) of Vorarlberg
		Bludenz \| Bregenz \| Dornbirn \| Feldkirch

Coordinates:

Austria

This article is part of the series:
Politics of Austria

Constitution of Austria
Executive
President (Heinz Fischer)

..... Click the link for more information.

Bregenz is the capital of Vorarlberg, the westernmost federal state of Austria. The town is located on the eastern shores of Lake Constance, the third-largest freshwater lake in Central Europe, between Switzerland in the east and Germany in the northwest.
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A Landeshauptmann (German for "country head man"; plural Landeshauptleute or Landeshauptmänner as in Styria till 1861; Landeshauptfrau is the female form, "country head woman") is an official title in German for certain political offices equivalent to a
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Herbert Sausgruber (born July, 24th 1946 in Bregenz) is governor of the Austrian state of Vorarlberg and chairman of the Vorarlberg ÖVP.

Study and Job

After the Matura
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Area is a physical quantity expressing the size of a part of a surface. The term Surface area is the summation of the areas of the exposed sides of an object.

Units

Units for measuring surface area include:

square metre = SI derived unit

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Square kilometre (U.S. spelling: square kilometer), symbol km², is a decimal multiple of the SI unit of surface area, the square metre, one of the SI derived units. 1 km² is equal to:

1,000,000 m²
100 ha (hectare)

Conversely:

1 m² = 0.

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population is the collection of people or organisms of a particular species living in a given geographic area or mortality, and migration, though the field encompasses many dimensions of population change including the family (marriage and divorce), public health, work and the
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Population density is a measurement of population per unit area or unit volume. It is frequently applied to living organisms, humans in particular.

Biological population densities

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Austria

This article is part of the series:
Politics of Austria

Constitution of Austria
Executive
President (Heinz Fischer)

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Anthem
Land der Berge, Land am Strome (German)
Land of Mountains, Land on the River
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Vienna (German: Wien [viːn], see also ) is the capital of Austria, and also one of the nine States of Austria. Vienna is Austria's primate city; with a population of about 1.
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Anthem
"Das Lied der Deutschen" (third stanza)
also called "Einigkeit und Recht und Freiheit"
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Freistaat Bayern
Free State of Bavaria
Flag Coat of arms

Details
Location

Coordinates
Time zone CET/CEST (UTC+1/+2)
Administration
Country
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Motto
Unus pro omnibus, omnes pro uno (Latin) (traditional)^[1]
"One for all, all for one"
Anthem
"Swiss Psalm"
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Graubünden or Grisons (German: Graubünden (help info ) [gʁaʊ'byndən]; Italian: Grigioni
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The Canton of St. Gallen (German: Kanton St. Gallen (help info ) ) is a canton of Switzerland. St. Gallen is located in the north east of Switzerland.
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Motto
"Für Gott, Fürst und Vaterland"
"For God, Prince and Fatherland"
Anthem
Oben am jungen Rhein
"High Above the Young Rhine"

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Tyrol (German: Tirol) is a state or Bundesland, located in the west of Austria. It comprises the Austrian part of the historical region of Tyrol.
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Dornbirn is a city in Vorarlberg, Austria. It is the administrative center of the district (Bezirk) Dornbirn, which also includes the city of Hohenems, and the market town Lustenau.
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Hohenems is a town in the westernmost Austrian province of Vorarlberg, in the Dornbirn district. It is located at .

Hohenems' attractions include a palace dating back to the 16th century, where parts of the Nibelungen Saga (see
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Feldkirch is a medieval city in the western Austrian state of Vorarlberg, at , on the border with Switzerland and Liechtenstein. It has a population of 28,604 (2001), and is the administrative center of the district Feldkirch.
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Bludenz is a city in the state of Vorarlberg in Austria. The town is surrounded by mountains at the meeting point of five different valleys,

The Klostertal
The Montafon
The Walgau
The Brandnertal
The Groß Walsertal.

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river is a natural waterway that transits water through a landscape from higher to lower elevations. It is an integral component of the water cycle. The water within a river is generally collected from precipitation through surface runoff, groundwater recharge (as seen at baseflow
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For the river Ill in France see Ill (France).

The Ill (all capitals: ILL) is a 72 km long tributary of the Rhine river in the western Austrian province of Vorarlberg.
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Montafon is the valley in Austria extending from Bludenz to the Silvretta. It is also known in the local dialect as Muntafu. The main village is Schruns. It is famous for skiing, hiking, and mountain-biking.
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Origin Grisons, Switzerland

Basin countries Switzerland, Liechtenstein, Austria, Germany, France, Netherlands
Length 1,320 km (820 mi)
Source elevation Vorderrhein: approx. 2,600 m (8,500 ft)
Hinterrhein: approx. 2,500 m (8,200 ft)

Avg.
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Motto
Unus pro omnibus, omnes pro uno (Latin) (traditional)^[1]
"One for all, all for one"
Anthem
"Swiss Psalm"
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The Bregenzer Ach is the main river of the Bregenzerwald, in the Vorarlberg Province of Austria. It is a tributary to the Lake Constance.

Tributaries of the Rhine

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Dornbirner Ach is a river in Vorarlberg, Austria, with its source up in the valley near the alpine village Ebnit. It flows through the famous "Rappenlochschlucht" gorge straight to Dornbirn, cuts through the town and the meanders off over a broad meadow landscape, the Lauterach
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