Belfort 6.31

Belfort is a city in northeastern France in the Bourgogne-Franche-Comté région, situated between Lyon and Strasbourg. It is the biggest town and the administrative town of the Territoire de Belfort département in the Bourgogne-Franche-Comté region. Belfort is 400km from Paris, 141km from Strasbourg, 290km from Lyon and 150km from Zürich. The residents of the city are called "Belfortains". The city is located on the Savoureuse, on the strategically important natural route between the Rhine and the Rhône – the Belfort Gap (Trouée de Belfort) or Burgundian Gate (Porte de Bourgogne). The city of Belfort has 50,199 inhabitants. Together with its suburbs and satellite towns, Belfort forms the largest agglomeration (metropolitan area) in Bourgogne-Franche-Comté region with an urban population of 308,601 inhabitants.HistoryBelfort's strategic location, in a natural gap between the Vosges and the Jura, on a route linking the Rhine and the Rhône, has attracted human settlement and made it a target for armies.The site of Belfort was inhabited in Gallo-Roman times and was subsequently recorded in the 13th century as a possession of the counts of Montbéliard, who granted it a charter in 1307.