Oppegård

Oppegård is located at the eastern coast of Bunnefjorden (originally called "Foli", like the Årungen lake to the south), which is an arm of Oslofjord. It includes the villages Oppegård, Svartskog and Kolbotn. The landscape is dominated by a vast part of the north-south-oriented lake Gjersjøen, which roughly divides the district into western and eastern sections. The lake Kolbotnvannet is located here as well. The undeveloped areas are largely covered by forest.

Oppegård is a largely residential suburb of Oslo, but also a business hub - hosting the Norwegian headquarters of several larger corporations (including Kodak and IBM) within its borders. Tax revenues from large corporations made Oppegård one of Norway's richest municipalities in the 1980s and 1990s. These revenues, and the wealth they brought, were lost in the 2000s when corporations were made to pay taxes directly to the national, rather than local, government.

Commuter trains connect Oppegård to Oslo, and makes the neighbourhoods close to the train stations (Rosenholm, Kolbotn, Solbråtan, Myrvoll, Greverud and Oppegård) popular residential areas.

[edit] History

Oppegård has been populated since the end of the last ice age. Archeological remains of hunter-gatherer societies dating back to 5000-6000 BCE have been found, as well as the remains of agriculatural settlements from 1000-2000 BCE. The main southern roads connecting Oslo to Sweden and Denmark have passed through Oppegård since the Iron Age.

The present-day municipality was created from the eastern part of the municipality of Nesodden in 1915. At the time, the population of Oppegård was only 600, the coat of arms has a yellow triangle for each of the 17 farms of Oppegård. The 1960s and 1970s saw a population boom, as larger housing projects established the Oppegård villages as suburbs of Oslo. The commercial centres along the main railroad axis are striking examples of the ugly, nominally functionalist architecture characteristic of that period of urbaninzation in Scandinavia, but many of Oppegårds residential areas are more tastefully designed. The original rustic Follo dialect is no longer spoken in Oppegård, but has been supplanted by the dialects of migrants and the urban dialect of Oslo.

Arctic explorer Roald Amundsen lived in Svartskog - his house is presently a museum, administered by the municipality. Svartskog is also home to a medieval stone church, and is likely the oldest settlement in Oppegård.

[edit] The name

The municipality (originally the parish) is named after the old farm Oppegård (Norse Uppigarđr), since the first church was built here. The first element is uppi 'upper', the last element is garđr 'farm'. (The farm is probably a part of an older a bigger farm.)

[edit] Coat-of-arms

The coat-of-arms is from modern times (1976). The 17 triangles symbolize 17 trees, which again symbolize the 17 old farms in the municipality. Most of the farms are lying in an area called Svartskog ('black forest').

[edit] Politics

Since 1968, coinciding with the population boom, the conservative party (Høyre) has held either a majority or plurality of representatives in the municipal council. Several leading politicians for Høyre began their political careers as mayors of Oppegård, including Rolf Presthus (Mayor 1968-1970, Conservative Party Leader and Minister of Finance) and Jan Petersen (mayor, 1975-1981, Conservative Party Leader and Minister of Foreign Affairs). The dominance of Høyre in local politics is somewhat of an anomaly, since Oppegård demographically is an urban middle class area rather than an example of the upper class or agribusiness communities that traditionally have been Høyre strongholds.

Former Prime Minister and leader of the Christian Democratic Party Kjell Magne Bondevik currently lives in Oppegård.

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