Bischofszell (Alemannic: Bischefzèl) is a village and a municipality in Weinfelden District in the canton of Thurgau in Switzerland. It is the seat of the district. In 1987, the city was awarded the Wakker Prize for the preservation of its architectural heritage. So was its neighboring city Hauptwil-Gottshaus in 1999. Geography Bischofszell consists of two parts - the older elevated part and the newer more industrial part located to the north. The Sitter flows in the Thur directly outside Bischofszell. The forest to the south-east and the riverbanks are popular recreation areas. The closest bigger city and capital of the neighboring canton St. Gallen is about 30 minutes away by train or car. Bischofszell has an area, , of . Of this area, or 55.1% is used for agricultural purposes, while or 24.5% is forested. Of the rest of the land, or 17.7% is settled (buildings or roads), or 2.9% is either rivers or lakes and or 0.3% is unproductive land. Of the built up area, industrial buildings made up 8.3% of the total area while housing and buildings made up 2.2% and transportation infrastructure made up 0.9%. while parks, green belts and sports fields made up 5.9%. Out of the forested land, 22.5% of the total land area is heavily forested and 2.1% is covered with orchards or small clusters of trees. Of the agricultural land, 47.4% is used for growing crops, while 7.7% is used for orchards or vine crops. All the water in the municipality is flowing water. The municipality is situated in Weinfelden District. It is located at the confluence of the Thur and Sitter, and includes the terrace south of the river. It consists of the town of Bischofszell-Nord/Sittertal and Bischofszell as well as Halden and part of Schweizersholz and Gottshaus (Stocken). Demographics Bischofszell has a population () of . , 22.3% of the population are foreign nationals. Over the last 10 years (1997–2007) the population has changed at a rate of -0.6%. Most of the population () speaks German (85.4%), with Portuguese being second most common ( 3.7%) and Serbo-Croatian being third ( 2.7%). , the gender distribution of the population was 49.5% male and 50.5% female. The population was made up of 2,047 Swiss men (37.3% of the population), and 673 (12.3%) non-Swiss men. There were 2,221 Swiss women (40.4%), and 551 (10.0%) non-Swiss women. In there were 31 live births to Swiss