page_title: Melide, Switzerland
section_title: Geography
hierarchical_section_title: Melide, Switzerland / Geography
caption_attribution_description: English: Lake Lugano and Melide Dam, in Ticino, Switzerland
context_page_description: Melide is a municipality in the district of Lugano in the canton of Ticino in Switzerland. The village lies very close to the mountain Monte San Salvatore and is directly on the Lake of Lugano. The Melide causeway to the east was built to make it possible to cross to Bissone and to allow a north-south highway to be built.
  Melide is known worldwide for the famous Swissminiatur, a museum that shows famous buildings in Switzerland presented in miniature form.
context_section_description: Melide has an area, as of 1997, of 1.67 square kilometers (0.64 sq mi).  Of this area, 0.22 km² (0.085 sq mi) or 13.2% is used for agricultural purposes, while 1.05 km² (0.41 sq mi) or 62.9% is forested.   Of the rest of the land, 0.57 km² (0.22 sq mi) or 34.1% is settled (buildings or roads), 0.01 km² (2.5 acres) or 0.6% is either rivers or lakes and 0.01 km² (2.5 acres) or 0.6% is unproductive land.
  Of the built up area, housing and buildings made up 13.2% and transportation infrastructure made up 13.8%.  Power and water infrastructure as well as other special developed areas made up 3.0% of the area while parks, green belts and sports fields made up 4.2%.  Out of the forested land, 60.5% of the total land area is heavily forested and 2.4% is covered with orchards or small clusters of trees.  Of the agricultural land, 0.0% is used for growing crops and 13.2% is used for alpine pastures.  All the water in the municipality is flowing water.
  The municipality is located in the Lugano district, on the western shore of Lake Lugano at the end of the Melide dam.  It consists of the village of Melide and, since 1863, part of Capo San Martino.
caption: Melide along Lake Lugano
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