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OpenCage ๐Ÿ‘‰๐ŸŒ

6/ Switzerland ๐Ÿ‡จ๐Ÿ‡ญ contains two foreign exclaves.

The first is Bรผsingen am Hochrhein, a German ๐Ÿ‡ฉ๐Ÿ‡ช exclave. It is entirely separated from the rest of Germany by a strip of land that contains the Swiss village of Dรถrflingen.

Politically, it is part of the German district of Konstanz, but economically part of the Swiss customs union, making it the only German village where people mostly use the Swiss franc.

en.wikipedia.org/wiki/B%C3%BCs

openstreetmap.org/?mlat=47.700

#geoweirdness
4 August at 9:41 | Open on en.osm.town
10 comments
OpenCage ๐Ÿ‘‰๐ŸŒ

7/ The second foreign exclave is Campione dโ€™Italia, an ๐Ÿ‡ฎ๐Ÿ‡น Italian "comune" only accessible via a mountainous road through Switzerland ๐Ÿ‡จ๐Ÿ‡ญ

en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Campione

openstreetmap.org/?mlat=45.972

It gets complex: Everyone uses the Swiss +41 dialing code except the town hall, which uses Italyโ€™s +39. Firefighters and ambulances are Swiss, whilst policing and postal services are Italian.

In 2020 the town joined the ๐Ÿ‡ช๐Ÿ‡บ EU Customs Union

en.wikipedia.org/wiki/European

#geoweirdness

7/ The second foreign exclave is Campione dโ€™Italia, an ๐Ÿ‡ฎ๐Ÿ‡น Italian "comune" only accessible via a mountainous road through Switzerland ๐Ÿ‡จ๐Ÿ‡ญ

en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Campione

openstreetmap.org/?mlat=45.972

It gets complex: Everyone uses the Swiss +41 dialing code except the town hall, which uses Italyโ€™s +39. Firefighters and ambulances are Swiss, whilst policing and postal services are Italian.
4 August at 9:43 | Open on en.osm.town
OpenCage ๐Ÿ‘‰๐ŸŒ

8/ While on the topic of postal systems, we should mention Switzerland's ๐Ÿ‡จ๐Ÿ‡ญ micro-state neighbor, Liechtenstein ๐Ÿ‡ฑ๐Ÿ‡ฎ (one of the world's two double-landlocked countries - the other is of course Uzbekistan ๐Ÿ‡บ๐Ÿ‡ฟ).

Liechtenstein uses the Swiss postal service and shares a customs and monetary union with Switzerland, meaning it uses the Swiss franc.

Another interesting Liechtenstein fact: it is the only country in the world with German as sole official language.

#geoweirdness
4 August at 9:47 | Open on en.osm.town
OpenCage ๐Ÿ‘‰๐ŸŒ

9/ On the other side of Liechtenstein ๐Ÿ‡ฑ๐Ÿ‡ฎ we have the Austrian ๐Ÿ‡ฆ๐Ÿ‡น state of Vorarlberg.

Following World War I the region held annexation referendum to join Switzerland ๐Ÿ‡จ๐Ÿ‡ญ.

An overwhelming 80% of voters supported the proposal.

Switzerland turned down this, and it never went ahead!

en.wikipedia.org/wiki/1919_Vor

#geoweirdness
4 August at 9:49 | Open on en.osm.town
OpenCage ๐Ÿ‘‰๐ŸŒ

10/ You might think that as such an old country as Switzerland ๐Ÿ‡จ๐Ÿ‡ญ has no border disputes, that everything has long since been settled.

But actually it does.

Switzerland, Austria ๐Ÿ‡ฆ๐Ÿ‡น, and Germany ๐Ÿ‡ฉ๐Ÿ‡ช have no formal agreement on the exact course of the border in Lake Constance

en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lake_Con

#geoweirdness
4 August at 9:51 | Open on en.osm.town
OpenCage ๐Ÿ‘‰๐ŸŒ

11/ The ๐Ÿ‡จ๐Ÿ‡ญ Switzerland ๐Ÿ‡ฉ๐Ÿ‡ช Germany border was also the topic last year, when it was decided to change to using the middle of the Rhein rather than the deepest point in the river (which moved over time).

The result was Germany gained 8 meters on the historic Bad Sรคckingen wooden bridge

swr.de/swraktuell/baden-wuertt

#geoweirdness
4 August at 9:54 | Open on en.osm.town
OpenCage ๐Ÿ‘‰๐ŸŒ replied to OpenCage

12/ As some of these maps have shown, there is a thriving OpenStreetMap community in Switzerland ๐Ÿ‡จ๐Ÿ‡ญ, and we had the pleasure of interviewing long-time community member Simon Poole @simon on our blog a few years back to learn more about the Alpine nationโ€™s rich opengeo culture:

blog.opencagedata.com/post/143

#OpenStreetMap
4 August at 9:57 | Open on en.osm.town
OpenCage ๐Ÿ‘‰๐ŸŒ replied to OpenCage

13/ Final point of Swiss #geoweirdness - As you may have noticed from the emojis in this thread, Switzerland ๐Ÿ‡จ๐Ÿ‡ญ is one of only two countries of the world with a square flag, the other being the Vatican ๐Ÿ‡ป๐Ÿ‡ฆ.

Nepal ๐Ÿ‡ณ๐Ÿ‡ต also has a "non-standard" flag shape.

en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Flag_of_

4 August at 9:59 | Open on en.osm.town
OpenCage ๐Ÿ‘‰๐ŸŒ replied to OpenCage

14/ That's it for our look at the #geoweirdness of Switzerland ๐Ÿ‡จ๐Ÿ‡ญ

Thanks for reading and sharing. What did we miss?

We have many more threads about specific countries and regions, border disputes, geocoding, etc over on our blog: blog.opencagedata.com/geothrea

If you liked Switzerland you may enjoy our threads about

Austria ๐Ÿ‡ฆ๐Ÿ‡น
en.osm.town/@opencage/11044556

Italy ๐Ÿ‡ฎ๐Ÿ‡น
en.osm.town/@opencage/10989192

Germany ๐Ÿ‡ฉ๐Ÿ‡ช
en.osm.town/@opencage/11115394

France ๐Ÿ‡ซ๐Ÿ‡ท
en.osm.town/@opencage/10993004

14/ That's it for our look at the #geoweirdness of Switzerland ๐Ÿ‡จ๐Ÿ‡ญ

Thanks for reading and sharing. What did we miss?

We have many more threads about specific countries and regions, border disputes, geocoding, etc over on our blog: blog.opencagedata.com/geothrea

If you liked Switzerland you may enjoy our threads about
4 August at 10:04 | Open on en.osm.town
Simon Poole

@opencage I wouldn't call that a border dispute, just a difference of opinion on what would be the preferred solution if there were negotiations on the topic. But there are no such negotiations and everybody seems to be perfectly happy with the current state of affairs.

PS: and yes it isn't mapped correctly on #OpenStreetMap as there is no tagging for "not actually a border".

4 August at 10:05 | Open on en.osm.town
Robin van der Linde

@opencage for some more background behind Bรผsingen, @thetimtraveller had a video on it: youtu.be/kIe62qN0FEo
Of course he also has one on Campione d'Italia: youtu.be/n1fqinoNiZE

4 August at 9:56 | Open on en.osm.town
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