Is this idea of changing the capital serious?

Nope, just some move by 5 young politicians to get noted and in their own words "to show how easy it is to start a citizens initiative in light of the Minarett vote and the Ausschaffungsinitiative".

Basically, they want to show how it is too easy for people to start such an initiative - it should be more complicated but needing less votes to get there. Plus a little bit of publicity can't hurt, if you plan a future in politics...

They certainly know already how to waste money and other peoples time, IMO...

Zürich was not awarded the ETH by the confederation, but Alfred von Escher simply made it clear to the union that, if they did not co-operate, he would build up a ZTH either as a private or as a Cantonal institution. Alfred von Escher made it clear that he would launch a giant museum himself unless the Landesmuseum would come to Zürich. AvE extended Zürich from the Sihl to what now is Escher-Wyss-Platz, he brought banking to Zürich big style by establishing SKA/CS and by taking SBG and SBV (now UBS) from Basel to Zürich, he supported Engineer Bürkli, and he built up Zch-HB and the connected railways-hub.

This why the man now "stands" on the Bahnhofplatz. But again, if you look at the League of Nations http://de.wikipedia.org/wiki/V%C3%B6lkerbund
you can easily see that it was NOT "thanks to its own merits" but thanks to Lord Robert Cecil that Geneva got that function. And what I still say is that Geneva with U.N.O. and IKRK/ICRC already has enough such functions

Lord Cecil moved the SdN to Geneva, say you?!

Alfred von Escher da superman. What a hero, I love this old way blackmailing, love it, can you imagine every city doing the same? "you give me da CFF HQ or I forbid the passage of the trains and build my own railway and charge you a fee for yours", how lovely Zurich. Anyway, I don't buy it, looks like a "super zürcher myth". Fact is the ETH was established in Zurich thanks to the confederation as a compensation for Zurich not getting the federal administration, after all is the confederation who's paying for it, not the grandsons of sir Alfred. The rest is... well, a nice story for zurcher kids.

Can you post links to english-written webpages when available? Or do you think everyone in this country is supposed to learn Zürcher german?

Anyway, fact 1- Zurich got help from the confederation on my levels, e.g. getting the ETH or the main offices of the Swiss National Bank, both arbitrary decisions, to name two. Fact 2- Geneva (and Basel too, I have to add) has been pretty much ignored by the same federal government compared to Zurich.

So why should Zurich receive anything more, like getting designated as capital of the country? It's almost an insult to other parts of the country tired of Zurich Zurich Zurich.

He at least was the chief of the Völkerbund, but the choice may have been the one of Georges Clémenceau. It is a difference with the Red Cross which was placed into Geneva by the rich Geneva businessman Henri Dunant

If you look at the history of Zürich and Geneva of the past 200 years, you can easily see that it was not democratic decisions, but coincidences, powerplays and compromises/decisions by outsiders who helped the two cities to their prominent roles of today. That Zürich is German speaking and close to Germany while NOT being in Germany and that Geneva is French speaking and close to France but NOT IN France was helpful in both cases.

A) there are NO WEBpages in Züritüütsch.
B) no, the confederation was OPPOSED to the ETH being in Zürich and wanted to have it in Bern
C) SBB CFF FFS is to a heavy part simply the company AvE sold to the union, which was Zürich based
D) the University is owned by the Canton of Zürich. And this of course was AvE 's idea about the TH
E) as you love the unique methods of Sir AvE, here another one. He forced the SNB to be centred in Zürich by threatening steps to have the Canton of Zürich getting out of the CHF and re-launching its central bank, and the union surrendered
F) Basel ? You simply forget that BASEL up to the mid-19th century was the clearly LARGEST and MOST IMPORTANT city of Switzerland with more university activity, more banking, more industry, more insurance business, more traffic connections. Further on, while Winterthur became part of the Canton of Zürich, Mülhausen/Mulhouse first was German and then gradually became French. But if you take Basel and MLH together, the duo-polis has a considerable potential. And MLH is a splendid city. MLH profited from President Giscard d'Estaing who established the French National Automobile Museum and the French National Railways Museum in MLH, true. But generally BSL/MLH do NOT need interference from either Paris or Bern/Zürich.
F-2) you now complain about the fate of Geneva and Basel. But Schaffhausen had the same fate or an even worse one. The reason is geography. The three cities were located in "bad" places. When people like Mum and me in the 1950ies/60ies on excursions towards Central Swtzerland spoke Schaffuuserisch, those Innerschwiizer regard it as a kind of Germany-German

AND FINALLY, most of all, Zürich shoud NOT even try to get the role of Federal Capital ! Most definitely not. To say it again, Bern since having become Federal Capital has declined in comparison to the other cities in the country in all respects expect the Federal administration. And Switzerland in most real things is governed by Cantonal governments and parliaments, even that role is astonishingly limted.

Back to my decentralisation ideas I placed earlier
- Foreign Ministry to Solothurn
- Justice Ministry to St. Gallen
- Traffic Ministry to Schaffhausen
- Defence Ministry to Rapperswil /SG
- Interior Ministry to Lugano
- Economy Ministry to Basel
- Finance Ministry to Chur
- - -
- the Ständerat (Senate) to Olten
- the Nationalrat (House of Reps) to Zug
- the Bundesrat onto the Gurten
- the Dépendence of the Bundesrat
onto the Salève (hired fm F for 99 years)
--
-- the BAZL (Swiss Federal Civil Aviation Authority) sent out
to Frauenfeld

THIS would make Bern free for free enterprise and dynamic developments

Ah yes, so just another unsubstantiated claim as usual then. Clemenceau proposed Paris, just in case.

Sure he did. But what did he propose when Paris got rejected by people like Lloyd George and Woodrow Wilson ?

And what about the "merits" of Geneva in this case ? The League of Nations came into being when the victors of WW-ONE, which means Britain, France, the USA and Italy, made the decisions, not Switzerland.

You farther up compared the LoN to the ICRC, but the Red Cross only came into existence on the basis of the hard work and the full involvement of Henri Dunant who even went bankrupt, left Geneva and went first to Paris and then into a kind of "exile" in Eastern Switzerland (Heiden/Appenzell-Ausserrhoden).
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Henry_Dunant

interesting is to see that in 1863, another Genevan was among the co-founders of the Red Cross, as shown HERE
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Guillaume_Henri_Dufour

I have noticed an intense dislike of all things Zurich by people from other cantons, so I don't think the initiative would ever pass. All Bern needs is a real international airport (or a faster train to Zurich/Geneva) to be more attractive (if that is what they want...)

And then there's still people who might wonder why the suisse romands, who are are swiss as anyone else, feel increasingly alienated in this country. Gurten? Seriously?... Frauenfeld? Rapperwil? you give more importance to those tiny villages than to Genève, Lausanne, Neuchâtel, Vevey-Montreux or Fribourg?

Hopefully you're just an exception. I was going to add something not very well sounding but I'll just stop answering your trolling comments instead.

If they stop speaking french ,half the problem would be solved

A) trains between Zürich and Bern ? already much faster than in the past, and still to be improved
B) trains between Bern and Geneva ? still leaves a lot to be desired. improvements however are planned
C) Bern-Belp ? there some decades ago WERE plans for a bigger airport for Bern, if I remember correctly in a place towards the Bielersee, but that idea was dropped. In the meantime, Belp was extended and improved. Their WEBsite
http://www.flughafenbern.ch/?setLang=2


shows that the place is not exactly an intercontinental Mega-Hub but quite a nice airport

and with nice restaurants (the first even a hotel)
http://www.airhotel.ch/restaurant/
http://www.propellerstuebli.ch/speis-trank.htm

and a "Schwimmbad" (Freibad) practically within the airport !

http://www.badi-info.ch/be/belp.html

Alright, let's improve the idea

- Foreign Ministry to Solothurn
- Justice Ministry to Lausanne
- Traffic Ministry to Schaffhausen
- Defence Ministry to Nyon
- Interior Ministry to Lugano
- Economy Ministry to Basel
- Finance Ministry to Geneva
- - -
- the Ständerat (Senate) to Olten
- the Nationalrat (House of Reps) to Neuchâtel
- the Bundesrat to Fribourg
- the Dépendence of the Bundesrat
onto the Salève (hired fm F for 99 years)

So to please also our 20% minority

While Rapperswil and Solothurn are nice towns and not tiny, Frauenfeld+Olten are of course mentioned as a joke.

It's actually more like 24.25%-25.39% of total population (first figure for residents in french-speaking areas only, second for residents in romand cantons as german speakers in fribourg and valais would also benefit) and 25% of the swiss economy. You never go to bed without having learned something new. You are welcomed.

Doesn't solve the other half of the the problem much unless they start speaking German.

I based my remark on what is the latest official statistics


Wohnbevölkerung Deutsch Französisch Italienisch Rätoromanisch Andere Sprachen

% % % % %


Total
1910 3'753'293 69.1 21.1 8.1 1.1 0.6
1920 3'880'320 70.9 21.3 6.1 1.1 0.6
1930 4'066'400 71.9 20.4 6.0 1.1 0.6
1941 4'265'703 72.6 20.7 5.2 1.1 0.4
1950 4'714'992 72.1 20.3 5.9 1.0 0.7
1960 5'429'061 69.3 18.9 9.5 0.9 1.4
1970 6'269'783 64.9 18.1 11.9 0.8 4.3
1980 6'365'960 65.0 18.4 9.8 0.8 6.0
1990 6'873'687 63.6 19.2 7.6 0.6 8.9
2000 7'288'010 63.7 20.4 6.5 0.5 9.0

Schweizer
1910 3'201'282 72.7 22.1 3.9 1.2 0.1
1920 3'477'935 73.0 21.7 4.0 1.2 0.1
1930 3'710'878 73.7 21.0 4.0 1.2 0.1
1941 4'042'149 73.9 20.9 3.9 1.1 0.2
1950 4'429'546 74.2 20.6 4.0 1.1 0.2
1960 4'844'322 74.4 20.2 4.1 1.0 0.3
1970 5'189'707 74.5 20.1 4.0 1.0 0.4
1980 5'420'986 73.5 20.1 4.5 0.9 1.0
1990 5'628'255 73.4 20.5 4.1 0.7 1.3
2000 5'792'484 72.5 21.0 4.3 0.6 1.6


And that admittedly is a bit dated .

Interesting however is that a CH-citizens only statistics is rather "better" for the French speakers than statistics about residents.

In other words, you with your estimate may be right or may be wrong.

What matters however is that there are not so many countries on the planet where 25% of the people have such a say as in Switzerland. Where such a minority has both the Interior AND the Exterior Minister. Where two out of four military CICs in wartime came from that minority. Where some of the BEST (YES Sir, no joke ) Bundesräte (Max Petipierre, Pierre Graber, Georges-André Chevallaz, Jean-Pascal Delamuraz) came from that minority.

The REAL problem of the CH-French-speakers is that French language is culturally based on a MAJority status !

Back to the Federal government. It looks as if Mr Burkhalter since departing from the Interior Ministry to the Foreign Ministry has improved quite heavily. It also looks as if the new Interior Minister Alain Berset is well on his way to become a great one. A bit too early to judge, sure, but worth a guess all the time.

So that I find the inferiority-complex often evident among CH-French-speakers a bit overdone.

Relax, they do NOT have to start speaking German. They only have to accept being a minority. But
- in which other country is the Supreme Court in a 18-25% minority area ?
- in which other country are some prime int'l org's in such an area ?
- in which other country are some major history people from that area ?
this list could be continued endlessly
AND could include the most important chocolate producer ever

and what about moving the capital to Geneva?