Swiss Maps

Interactive visualization of Swiss federal votation results and demographic statistics on a geographic map.

Features

Votation map (/)

• Choropleth map colored by % yes votes at canton, district, and municipality level
• Click a canton to zoom in and see district/municipality breakdown
• Hover tooltips with result details
• 4 past and upcoming votation dates (Sep/Nov 2025, Mar/Jun 2026)
• Defaults to the most recent past votation (skips future dates with no data)

Demographics map (/demographics)

• 37 indicators across 10 groups: context (urban/periurban/rural typology), population, age, vital statistics (birth/death/marriage/divorce), land use, economy (employment by sector), housing, social, religion (2000 census), and politics
• Urban/rural typology: categorical 3-class map (dark blue = urban, medium = periurban, light = rural) with swatch legend
• Religion: Catholic %, Reformed %, Muslim %, no religion %, other — from 2000 census (last available at municipality level)
• Party votes shown individually plus a computed left–right index (diverging red↔blue scale)
• Sequential blue scale for continuous indicators; P5–P95 domain per topic

Trade map (/trade)

• World choropleth map with curved arc lines connecting Switzerland to each trading partner
• Arc width = trade volume (total or sector); arc color = green (CH surplus) / red (CH deficit) — always based on the active sector's balance, not a flat color
• Sector filter (9 sectors): recalculates arc sizing + balance + sorting for the selected sector only
• Per-country sector breakdown from SwissImpex 2025 HS8 data — shown in hover tooltip and selected-country card with % share + estimated CHF value per sector
• Click a country dot or sidebar row to select and pin the detail card; click Switzerland to show all flows
• FTA status filter (EU bilateral / in force / framework / negotiating / signed / all)
• 96 trading partners from official 2024 BAZG data (business cycle total, excl. precious metals)
• Sidebar shows global sector export breakdown (pharma 49%, machines 12%, watches 10%, …)

Correlation scatter (in votation sidebar)

• Inline SVG scatter: X = any demographic indicator, Y = % yes votes
• Shows canton-level dots (26 points) by default; switches to municipality-level dots when a canton is selected
• Linear regression line + Pearson r with plain-language interpretation
• Topic picker groups match the demographics page

Shared

• Full i18n: DE / FR / IT / RM / EN (UI + votation titles from official data)
• Mobile-responsive with collapsible sidebar
• English as default language

Running locally

pnpm install
pnpm dev        # requires geo + data files — see pipeline below

Data pipeline

All data is preprocessed by a Python pipeline (requires uv) and served as static files.

cd pipeline
uv sync

# One-time: Swiss boundaries from swisstopo (~50MB)
uv run python scripts/download_boundaries.py
uv run python scripts/export_geo.py

# Votation results
uv run python scripts/download_votations.py
uv run python scripts/download_votations.py --add YYYYMMDD   # add a new date

# Trade data (BAZG official 2024 actuals — re-run to refresh)
uv run python scripts/download_trade.py

# Demographic indicators — run all three, in order:
uv run python scripts/download_demographics.py   # BFS Regionalportraits 2021 (30 indicators, 2019 data)
uv run python scripts/download_typology.py       # swisstopo urban/periurban/rural classification
uv run python scripts/download_religion.py       # BFS 2000 census religion data (2000 data only)

See pipeline/DATA_SOURCES.md for a full breakdown of every dataset, indicator, reference year, and known limitations (income/unemployment/post-2000 religion are not available via API).

Data sources

• Trade (bilateral totals): BAZG Annual Report 2024 — 2024 actuals, business cycle total (excl. precious metals), 245 countries
• Trade (sector breakdown): SwissImpex / BAZG TN8_VK — 2025 full year, HS8 tariff × country × transport mode; used for per-country sector shares
• Geography: swisstopo swissBOUNDARIES3D — OGD license
• Votation results: opendata.swiss federal votation JSON API
• Demographic indicators: BFS Regionalportraits 2021 — 30 indicators, ref. year 2019
• Religion: BFS Volkszählung 2000 (PxWeb px-x-4003000000_122) — 2000 data only, no municipality-level religion data exists post-2000
• Urban/rural typology: swisstopo g1a22 agglomeration shapefile — 3 classes (urban/periurban/rural)

Tech stack

Next.js 16 · React 19 · MapLibre GL JS · shadcn/ui · Tailwind CSS 4 · TypeScript · Python/GeoPandas

notes

for easier deployment, all data is currently pushed to the repo