BY CAR

Zürich provides two large Park + Ride facilities for cars during EURO 2008. Both are situated directly off the motorway, and both provide excellent train and bus services to the town centre and the stadium. Public transport is included in the EURO match tickets for the match day and the following day till 12 noon. Visitors without EURO match tickets will find the best public transport tickets at www.sbb.ch/euro08 (all of Switzerland) and at www.zvv.ch (Canton Zürich).

From the Park + Ride facility to the stadium

• Parking North (A51 Exit No. 2 Airport):
  • The parking facility is situated directly at Zürich Airport and is easy to reach from the west (Basel, Bern) and from the east via the A1 motorway.
  • Exit the motorway at the Zürich-Nord motorway junction, direction Airport (A51). The Park + Ride facility is signposted from the motorway.
• Parking South (A3 Exit No. 2 Brunau):
  • The parking facility is situated directly at the motorway exit Zürich-Brunau and is easy to reach from the south (Chur, Lucerne, Ticino) via the A3 motorway.
  • The Park + Ride facility is signposted from the motorway.
  • From 2 hours before till 2 hours after the match a special bus service will take you directly from the parking lot to the stadium in approx. 15 minutes. Alternatively, you can take the S-Bahn (S4) from Brunau station directly to the town centre (main station).
• Once you have parked your car a train will take you to the town centre (main station) in 10 to 15 minutes, from where you can either walk (approx. 45 minutes) or take a tram (approx. 15 minutes) to the stadium. A rough estimate of the time required to get from the northern Park + Ride facility to the stadium would be 1 hour.

Further Information

• There are no parking places around the stadium.
• Cars using the Park + Ride facility pay a fee of CHF 25.
• The train and bus services are free of charge for EURO match ticket holders.
• Other visitors are advised to purchase a ZVV day ticket for the zones 10 and 21 (enter destination code 8000). This ticket is also valid for the return journey to the Park + Ride facility after the match.
• Car navigation systems: Please switch off your navigation system when you reach the outskirts of Zürich and follow the EURO signs to the car park!
• If you are staying in or around Zürich, we recommend that you park your car at your hotel, campsite etc. On match day, leave your car there and take a train, a bus or a tram to the stadium, or simply go by bicycle or on foot. There are no parking facilities around the stadium.

With 340,000 inhabitants, Zurich is the biggest city in Switzerland and joins Basel, Berne and Geneva as Swiss hosts for UEFA EURO 2008™. The city’s mayor Elmar Ledergerber is eagerly awaiting the event and has a personal message for the fans coming to the tournament, which he has shared with euro2008.com.

A hearty welcome to our guests from all over Europe. We want to present ourselves as the perfect host and to do so we are undertaking thorough preparations. There will be an array of events to enthuse, impress and hopefully make our guests thirsty for more in Zurich. Personally, I can’t wait. The city of Zurich can use this opportunity as a platform to present its diversity to the rest of the world. We want to show off the city’s attractions, as well as fulfilling our obligations as a host. The honour of being chosen gives us added responsibility, which in my opinion is the perfect motivation to put on a great UEFA EURO 2008™.
Stadium revamp
At the moment the Letzigrund Stadium is being redeveloped. It should be finished and ready for use by summer 2007. The other preparations, such as the security, transport and marketing arrangements, are also moving along smoothly. Indeed, we are still within our time frame.
Public viewing
The public screening of events is becoming increasingly popular. This is primarily due to the demand for tickets exceeding supply and the enjoyment that can be gained from watching a game with thousands of others. During the 2006 FIFA World Cup, we held live screenings on the Sechselautenplatz in the centre of the city and a huge number of spectators came along. This suggested to us that there should be somewhere in the centre of town for fans to come and watch the games. We intend to do all that is possible to offer this possibility so that as many fans as possible can enjoy a great footballing feast.
Personal pride
Taking on this challenge fills me with immense personal pride. The same can be said for the team of people who pull the strings in the background. They are working with passion and at full speed as the tournament approaches. I am sure that we will all enjoy an unforgettable and exciting UEFA European Championship.

There are officially 376,815 people (since Dec. 31st 2007) living in Switzerland’s largest city. 30.6% of the registered inhabitants of Zürich do not hold Swiss citizenship, which is 115,379 people . German citizens make up the largest group of foreigners in the city with 22.0%, followed by immigrants from Kosovo, Albania, Italy. The population of the city proper including suburbs 1.08 million people. However, the entire metropolitan area (including the cities of Winterthur, Baden, Brugg, Schaffhausen, Frauenfeld, Uster/Wetzikon, Rapperswil-Jona and Zug) has a population of around 1.68 million people.

Languages

The official language used by the government and in most publications is German, while the most commonly spoken dialect in Zürich is Zürichdeutsch (Zürich German), which is a local dialect of Swiss German. As of 2000, German is the mother-tongue of 77.7% of the population. Albanian (5.8%) follows behind, and Italian is the third-most common native language at 4.7% of the population. Other native languages spoken by more than 1% of the population include South Slavic languages (2.2%) — this includes Serbian, Croatian, Macedonian, and Slovenian), Spanish (2.2%), French (2.1%), English (1.8%), Portuguese (1.6%).

Religion

Since the reformation led by Huldrych Zwingli, Zürich has remained the center and stronghold of Protestantism in Switzerland. In the course of the 20th century, this has changed slightly as Catholics now make up the largest religious group in the city, with 33.3%. More and more inhabitants of the city declare themselves as being without religion (this was 16.8% of the population in 2000).

Social

The level of unemployment in Zürich is 2.6% (August 2007). About 4% of the city population (15,500 people) live either directly or indirectly on welfare from the state (April 2005).