Kutzenhausen, Bas-Rhin


Kutzenhausen is a commune in the Bas-Rhin department in Grand Est in north-eastern France.
Kutzenhausen lies to the south of Wissembourg, but still within the Parc naturel régional des Vosges du Nord.
This commune is located in the historic and cultural region of Alsace.
WWW kutzenhausen.saisondor.fr

Geography

Location

The commune is 2.3 km from Soulz-sous-Forêts, 2.6 from Merkwiller-Pechelbronn, 5.8 from Lobsann and 6.5 from Surbourg.
The locality is part of the Outre-Forêt nature reserve.

Geology and relief

Commune member of the Northern Vosges Regional Nature Park.
Mountain: Grand Wintersberg.

Seismicity

The commune is located in a moderate seismicity zone.

Hydrography

The commune is located in the Rhine catchment area within the Rhine-Meuse basin. It is drained by the Seltzbach stream, the Froeschwillerbach stream and the Sumpfgraben stream.
The Seltzbach, which is 33 km long, rises in the commune of Gœrsdorf and flows into the Sauer at Seltz, after passing through 14 communes.

Climate

In 2010, the commune's climate was classified as that of the Montargnard margins, according to a study by the French National Centre for Scientific Research, based on a series of data covering the period 1971-2000. In 2020, Météo-France published a typology of climates in mainland France in which the commune is exposed to a semi-continental climate and is in a transition zone between the ‘Vosges’ and ‘Alsace’ climatic regions.
For the period 1971-2000, the average annual temperature was 10.6°C, with an annual temperature range of 17.8°C. The average cumulative annual rainfall is 820 mm, with 10.6 days of precipitation in January and 10.2 days in July. For the period 1991-2020, the average annual temperature recorded at the nearest Météo-France weather station, ‘Preuschdorf’, in the commune of Preuschdorf, 4 km away as the crow flies, is 11.3°C, and the average annual total rainfall is 834.2 mm. The maximum temperature recorded at this station is 39.8°C, reached on 4 July 2015; the minimum temperature is -19.9°C, reached on 8 January 1985.
The commune's climate parameters have been estimated for the middle of the century according to different greenhouse gas emission scenarios based on the new DRIAS-2020 reference climate projections. They can be consulted on a dedicated website published by Météo-France in November 2022.

Communications and transport

Roads

Situated between Soultz-sous-Forêts and Merkwiller-Pechelbronn, it is crossed by the D 28 departmental road.

Public transport

[SNCF]

Neighbouring communes

Intercommunality

Commune member of the Sauer-Pechelbronn community of communes.

Town planning

Typology

As of 1 January 2024, Kutzenhausen is classified as a rural town, according to the new seven-level communal density grid defined by INSEE in 2022. It is located outside an urban unit. The commune is also part of the Haguenau catchment area, of which it is an outlying commune. This area, which includes 34 communes, is categorised as having between 50,000 and less than 200,000 inhabitants.

Land use

The commune's land use, as revealed by the European biophysical land cover database Corine Land Cover, is characterised by the importance of agricultural land, a proportion roughly equivalent to that of 1990. The detailed breakdown in 2018 is as follows: arable land, forests, urbanised areas, grassland, permanent crops. The evolution of land use in the commune and its infrastructure can be seen on the various cartographic representations of the area: the Cassini map, the staff map and the IGN maps or aerial photos for the current period.
Commune covered by the Pechelbronn inter-municipal local planning scheme.

Toponymy

From Goten hause, a possession of the nearby abbey of Wissembourg; another Kutzenhausen was located near Drusenheim and probably owes its name to the former abbey of Arnulfsau. In the past, the abbeys were also called Goten hause, an old form spelt Chuzichusi.

History

The municipality of Kutzenhausen originated from the former bailliage and, at the beginning of the 19th century, included the towns of Niederkutzenhausen and Feldbach, now the villages of Kutzenhausen, Oberkutzenhausen, Merkwiller and Hoelschloch. In 1888, these two districts formed the new commune of Merkwiller-Pechelbronn consisting of Merkwiller and Hoelschloch. On 1 January 2015, Kutzenhausen was transferred from the arrondissement of Wissembourg to the arrondissement of Haguenau-Wissembourg. Oberkutzenhausen was its own commune until the early 1790s.
In France, the first oil wells were sunk in Kutzenhausen. Oil production, together with a refinery, continued until the 1970s.

Politics and administration

Budget and taxation 2022

In 2022, the commune's budget was made up as follows:
  • Total operating income: €596,000, i.e. €642 per inhabitant;
  • Total operating expenses: €441,000, i.e. €475 per inhabitant;
  • Total investment resources: €727,000, i.e. €783 per inhabitant;
  • Total investment expenditure: €625,000, i.e. €672 per capita;
  • Debt: €684,000, i.e. €736 per capita.
With the following tax rates:
  • Council tax: 8.50%;
  • Property tax on built-up properties: 25.67%;
  • Property tax on non-built-up properties: 48.00%;
  • Additional tax on non-built property: 0%;
  • Business property tax: 0%.
Key figures Household income and poverty in 2020: median disposable income per consumption unit in 2020: €25,020.

Economy

Business and commerce

Agriculture

  • Growing cereals, pulses and oilseeds.
  • Associated crop and livestock farming.

Tourism

  • Traditional restaurants.
  • Restaurants and accommodation in Merkwiller-Pechelbronn, Soultz-sous-Forêts.

Shops

  • Shops and services in Soultz-sous-Forêts.

Population

Demographics

Source:
YearPopulationEvolution
1793997N/A
18001,156 159
18061,310 154
18211,444 134
18311,559 115
18361,487 72
18411,370 117
18461,391 21
18511,297 94
18561,063 234
18611,040 23
18661,038 2
18711,050 12
18751,049 1
18801,013 36
18851,062 49
1890692 370
1895730 38
1900722 8
1905754 32
1910752 2
1921756 4
1926828 72
1931922 94
1936965 33
1946958 7
1954823 135
1962806 17
1968785 21
1975719 66
1982713 6
1990740 27
1999783 43
2006830 47
2007837 7
2008874 37
2009909 35
2010906 3
2011902 4
2012899 3
2013904 5
2014927 23
2015923 4
2016919 4
2017915 4
2018912 3
2019913 1
2020917 4
2021921 4
2022924 3

Education

Educational establishments :
  • Primary school.
  • Nursery school.

Health

Health professionals and establishments:

Worship

Twin towns

Places and monuments

Religious heritage

  • Protestant church, rue de l'église, built between 1763 and 1765, used alternately by Protestants and Catholics until a Catholic church was built in 1905.
  • * Great organ on gallery.
  • Catholic church, rue des Acacias, built to plans by architect Bruno Steller between 1903 and 1905. Consecrated in 1905 by the bishop-coadjutor Zorn von Bulach, the patron saint of the church is St George.
  • * Organ on gallery.
  • Chapel Notre-Dame-de-la-Paix.
  • The former synagogue. Destroyed in 1940 by the Hitlerjugend, the youth wing of the Nazi party, it was destroyed in 1957 because it was in danger of collapsing.
  • War memorial: conflicts commemorated: Franco-German war of 1914–1918 - 1939–1945 - AFN-Algeria (1954–1962).
  • Calvary.

Other heritage

  • Mining remains, including a wooded slag heap.
  • The commune is home to a museum of folk arts and traditions, the Maison rurale de l'Outre-Forêt, now a heritage interpretation centre.
  • Porch tower at no. 26 route de Soultz.
  • Bench known as the King of Rome bench.
  • Well known as the pendulum well.

Personalities linked to the town