Gau-Bickelheim

Gau-Bickelheim is an Ortsgemeinde – a municipality belonging to a Verbandsgemeinde, a kind of collective municipality – in the Alzey-Worms district in Rhineland-Palatinate, Germany.

Gau-Bickelheim
Coat of arms
Location of Gau-Bickelheim within Alzey-Worms district
Gau-Bickelheim
Gau-Bickelheim
Coordinates: 49°50′08″N 08°01′04″E
CountryGermany
StateRhineland-Palatinate
DistrictAlzey-Worms
Municipal assoc.Wöllstein
Government
 • MayorFriedrich Janz
Area
 • Total7.99 km2 (3.08 sq mi)
Elevation
139 m (456 ft)
Population
 (2019-12-31)[1]
 • Total2,136
 • Density270/km2 (690/sq mi)
Time zoneUTC+01:00 (CET)
 • Summer (DST)UTC+02:00 (CEST)
Postal codes
55599
Dialling codes06701
Vehicle registrationAZ
Websitewww.gau-bickelheim.de

Geography

Location

Gau-Bickelheim lies south of the Wißberg (mountain) in the Rheinhessisches Hügelland (Rhenish-Hessian Uplands).

Politics

Municipal council

The council is made up of 16 council members, who were elected at the municipal election held on 7 June 2009, and the honorary mayor as chairman.

The municipal election held on 7 June 2009 yielded the following results:[2]

CDUWG Gau-Bickelh.WG ErbenichGesamt
200976316 seats

Mayor

Gau-Bickelheim's mayor is Friedrich Janz (CDU).

Coat of arms

The municipality's arms might be described thus: Per fess abased argent three pickaxes palewise in fess, the middle one abased, gules, and gules a wheel spoked of six of the first.

The pickaxes are a canting charge: “Pickaxe” is Pickel in German, which sounds rather like the second and third syllables of the municipality's name, Gau-Bickelheim. The escutcheon's base contains the Wheel of Mainz, an historical symbol of Electoral Mainz.[3]

Town partnerships

Culture and sightseeing
The Kreuzkapelle on the Wißberg near Gau-Bickelheim

Buildings
  • Pfarrkirche St. Martin (“Saint Martin’s Parish Church”)[4]
  • Kreuzkapelle (“Cross Chapel”)

Economy and infrastructure

Transport

Running through the municipality is Bundesstraße 420. Running nearby from northwest to southeast is the Autobahn A 61. The Gau-Bickelheim interchange (Nr. 52) is not right on Bundesstraße 420, but rather, it can be reached over Bundesstraße 50. The interchange itself is rather a sprawling one and looks somewhat like a half cloverleaf. This came about because the original plan called for there to be an interchange between the A 60 and the A 61 here.[5] In the mid 1990s, an off-highway service centre was built nearby.

Gau-Bickelheim has at its disposal a railway station on the Rheinhessenbahn.

Public institutions

Notable people
  • The writer Arno Schmidt lived for a short while in Gau-Bickelheim after the Second World War as an Umsiedler (member of a mass migration). The municipality is mentioned in passing at the beginning of the narrative Schwarze Spiegel (“Black Mirrors”). The narrative Die Umsiedler gives this time a literary treatment.

References
  1. "Bevölkerungsstand 2019, Kreise, Gemeinden, Verbandsgemeinden". Statistisches Landesamt Rheinland-Pfalz (in German). 2020.
  2. Kommunalwahl Rheinland-Pfalz 2009, Gemeinderat
  3. Description and explanation of Gau-Bickelheim’s arms
  4. Pfarrkirche St. Martin
  5. Netzplan vom 1. Januar 1976
  6. Polizeiautobahnstation Gau-Bickelheim Archived 2011-01-12 at the Wayback Machine
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