Zürich voters ban noisy leaf blowers

Summary

Zurich voters ban petrol-powered leaf blowers Keystone-SDA Listen to the article Listening the article Toggle language selector English (US) English (British) Generated with artificial intelligence. The people of Zurich have had enough of the noise of leaf blowers. Voters have banned petrol-powered machines with a 61.7% majority. This content was published on September 28, 2025 - 17:16 +Get the most important news from Switzerland in your inbox There is also a new restriction for battery-powered models. They may only be used from October to December. Use in other months is only permitted in exceptional cases, for example for street cleaning after the Street Parade. + Has Swiss democracy become decadent with vote on leaf blowers? These new restrictions apply to both private individuals and municipal employees. Some 75,248 of voters were in favour of the necessary partial revision of the police ordinance, while 46,717 rejected the leaf blower ban. The turnout was 52.8%. Years of fighting This referendum came about after a group of parliamentary parties launched a referendum to challenge the city parliament’s decision to ban leaf blowers. They argued that the ban was an “expression of a culture of prohibition”. The fight against leaf blowers has been going on in Zurich for a long time. Back in 2013, the Greens submitted a petition with 4,329 signatures. The initiative that led to the current ban was submitted by the Greens and Social Democrats in 2022. More More Swiss democracy Religious holiday ‘dance ban’ lifted by Swiss canton This content was published on Sep 28, 2025 Dancing and sport are now permitted on key religious dates in the Swiss canton of Thurgau. Read more: Religious holiday ‘dance ban’ lifted by Swiss canton Translated from German with DeepL/mga How we work We select the most relevant news for an international audience and use automatic translation tools to translate them into English. A journalist then reviews the translation for clarity and accuracy b...