New caravans on the Enikerhof fuel neighbourhood dispute

The differences between farmer Daniel Rüttimann and the residents of Klostermatt have hardened further. Not all the parties are willing to talk.

The dispute over the caravans on the Enikerhof farm in Cham has not been resolved. Last week, a resident of the Klostermatt neighbourhood adjacent to the farm contacted the Zuger Zeitung newspaper. He said that the caravans were now parked directly in front of his bedroom on a field next to the neighbourhood. A visit on Tuesday afternoon, 2 July, showed that this was the case.

Following the coronavirus summer of 2020/2021, farmer Daniel Rüttimann has regularly allowed guests to camp on his farm, although he doesn’t have a licence to operate a campsite with electricity and access to fresh water. But this has now been the case on the Enikerhof farm since the summer of 2022. This is not particularly unusual - as research has shown, many official campsites in Switzerland were originally set up at random, as required, and were initially without a licence.

At the beginning of August 2023, a municipal employee visited the Enikerhof at the request of the canton. He recommended that a planning application for a campsite should be submitted as quickly as possible, which was done three weeks later. Over 30 objections were received, however, and, in the end, the application failed due to the zoning plan.

The municipality was accommodating
Daniel Rüttimann was then ordered by the municipality to remove the caravans and mini-houses (Tiny Houses) from the farm. He didn’t comply with the deadline set, because the conditions in spring made it impossible to move some of the structures out of the muddy ground. It was also difficult to find a new location for the Tiny Houses.

There are still some on the site today. As the municipality wrote in response to a recent enquiry, these are unoccupied, and a new location is being sought for them. In the knowledge that this is difficult, the municipality is being accommodating and is currently refraining from pressing charges. The condition is, however, that they must not be lived in.

Daniel Rüttimann submitted another planning application in April of this year, for a much smaller project. The farmer wants to build three pitches for mobile homes on his land. As the application is an ongoing process, the municipality does not want to say whether there is any opposition. However, as the Klostermatt resident reports, several objections have also been raised.

Local residents feel provoked
Daniel Rüttimann had originally placed his 'guests' on a field some distance from the Klostermatt area. As a new development on Tuesday afternoon last week, however, the vehicles are now parked right next to the residential area, where some bedroom windows look directly out onto the caravans. Residents have complained about noise from the guests themselves, their dogs and the power generators.

And some are certain that Daniel Rüttimann decided to place his ‘guests’ right next to the residential area as an act of defiance. After all, he knows that many of the objections to his planned campsite came from the Klostermatt neighbourhood. "Daniel Rüttimann is probably using this minority to provoke us wherever he can," wrote the Klostermatt resident.

What is meant by "minority" is that the guests are Swiss ‘travellers’, and this has been confirmed by the municipality of Cham. They are a minority that is recognised in Switzerland, and they have been seeking additional transit places for years. But there are not enough of these places. The cantons and municipalities are required to offer suitable places so that Swiss travellers can continue their traditional way of life.

Caravans on the Enikerhof are an ongoing issue in the municipality             Archive image: Matthias Jurt
The protected meadow is marked in red; two stages of the Klostermatt neighbourhood can be seen at the bottom right               Screenshot/ZugMap

Spontaneous stops are permitted
There is only one transit site in Cham, which is located near the Oberwilerwald wood. "If this is full, the travellers need to be able to temporarily set up their caravans at other suitable locations," says the municipality. These are so-called ’spontaneous stops’, and are permitted twice a year for four weeks at a time. The group that is currently on Daniel Rüttimann's farm was directed there by the canton, as the transit site at Oberwilerwald was already full.

"However, it has now been established that vehicles and trailers are also located in the area of the property that is part of a landscape protection zone," says the municipality. The law states that the landscape protection zone serves to "preserve or restore particularly beautiful and valuable landscapes in their diversity and character". Parking vehicles of any kind in it "does not correspond to the purpose of the landscape protection zone". Daniel Rüttimann has therefore been instructed to direct people and their vehicles away from the zone by the middle of this week.

The municipality also informed the farmer that a complaint would be filed if the deadline was not met, although it has not yet come to that. As of Thursday morning, 4 July, the vehicles had been moved further west out of the protection zone and away from the residential area.

Rüttimann wants mutual respect again
In an interview with the Zuger Zeitung newspaper, Daniel Rüttimann denies having moved the travellers to the lower field as a provocation. He decided to do this because there were been a lot of vehicles, and people would thereby have had more space. He was not even aware that the meadow was a protected zone until the municipality contacted him.

The question remains: what happens next? "A personal dialogue, for example with representatives of Klostermatt and the municipality, would be one solution," says Daniel Rüttimann. At the moment, however, it is important to wait and see what happens and to respect the deadlines and procedures that have been set. "It would be important to me that we all respect each other once again. In the spirit of tolerance, respect and cosmopolitanism," he says.

An end to the dispute is not yet in sight
The Klostermatt residents do not appear to be open to a clarifying dialogue at the moment. When asked what could happen next, the resident writes that "after sleepless nights, with caravans only twelve metres from the bedroom, objections, phone calls with legal protection, etc., I really can't think of anything sensible at the moment". Daniel Rüttimann should "apologise for the trouble he has caused with the travellers" and "completely abandon the camping site plans".

The municipality of Cham also responded to the enquiry: "As we are in charge of various ongoing proceedings in this case, we cannot act as a mediator." It is available for discussions, however.

It is also important to the municipality that information is provided correctly and accurately and that there is mutual respect, even when opinions differ. The legal situation regarding travellers is a given. "It’s just as important to us that the legal framework is adhered to."

It remains to be seen whether the parties at odds will sit down at the same table. And this is probably unavoidable in order to end, or at least settle the dispute.