Wirges

Town in Rhineland-Palatinate, Germany

Coat of arms

Location of Wirges within Westerwaldkreis district

(2019–24) Andreas Weidenfeller^[1] (CDU)Area

• Total10.13 km² (3.91 sq mi)Elevation

267 m (876 ft)Population

(2022-12-31)^[2]

• Total5,641 • Density560/km² (1,400/sq mi)Time zoneUTC+01:00 (CET) • Summer (DST)UTC+02:00 (CEST)Postal codes

56422

Dialling codes02602Vehicle registrationWWWebsitewww.wirges.eu

Wirges (German pronunciation: [ˈvɪʁɡəs] ^ⓘ) is a town in the Westerwaldkreis in Rhineland-Palatinate, Germany.

Geography

Wirges lies in a high hollow in the further Westerwald between Köppel and Malberg, roughly 5 km northwest of Montabaur and 20 km northeast of Koblenz. It was granted town rights in 1975. Wirges is the seat of the Verbandsgemeinde of Wirges, a kind of collective municipality. The people of Wirges call themselves Wirgeser.

Politics

Town council

The council is made up of 22 council members, as well as the honorary and presiding mayor (Stadtbürgermeister), who were elected in a municipal election on 7 June 2009.

Allocation of seats in the municipal council:^[3]

	CDU	SPD	FDP	FW	Total
2009	12	8	2	–	22 seats
2004	12	9	–	1	22 seats

Coat of arms

The escutcheon has the shape of a late Gothic round shield with horizontal upper edge and sides meeting it at right angles. The town’s arms are those once borne in days of yore by the Widergis noble family, whose seat was in Wirges.

Town partnerships

Wirges has partnership arrangements with these places:

Montchanin, Saône-et-Loire, France
Samobor, Zagreb County, Croatia

Economy and infrastructure

East of the town runs Bundesstraße 255 linking Montabaur and Rennerod. The nearest Autobahn interchange is Montabaur on the A 3 (Cologne–Frankfurt), some 3 km away. The nearest InterCityExpress stop is at Montabaur station on the Cologne-Frankfurt high-speed rail line. The town lies on the Lower Westerwald Railway (Unterwesterwaldbahn) from Limburg to Siershahn.

Sport and culture

SpVgg EGC Wirges’ first team plays in the football Oberliga Südwest; the A-youth have reached the Regionalliga Süd. The men’s second team play in the Rheinlandliga.

The main church is the Westerwälder Dom St. Bonifatius

Furthermore, Wirges has several choirs, a band and a music club.

Notable people

1926: Kurt Isselbacher, physician
1951: Gerd Andres, politician

References

^ Direktwahlen 2019, Westerwaldkreis, Landeswahlleiter Rheinland-Pfalz, accessed 9 August 2021.
^ "Bevölkerungsstand 2022, Kreise, Gemeinden, Verbandsgemeinden" (PDF) (in German). Statistisches Landesamt Rheinland-Pfalz. 2023.
^ "Local Elections Rhineland-Palatinate 2009" (in German). Retrieved 17 June 2013.