Ille-et-Vilaine

Ille-et-Vilaine
Department
Coat of arms
Location of Ille-et-Vilaine in France
Coordinates: 48°10′N 01°40′W / 48.167°N 1.667°W / 48.167; -1.667Coordinates: 48°10′N 01°40′W / 48.167°N 1.667°W / 48.167; -1.667
Country	France
Region	Brittany
Prefecture	Rennes
Subprefectures	Fougères Redon Saint-Malo
Government
• President of the General Council	Jean-Louis Tourenne (PS)
Area
• Total	6,775 km2 (2,616 sq mi)
Population (2013)
• Total	1,019,923
• Rank	23rd
• Density	150/km2 (390/sq mi)
Time zone	CET (UTC+1)
• Summer (DST)	CEST (UTC+2)
Department number	35
Arrondissements	4
Cantons	27
Communes	351
^1 French Land Register data, which exclude estuaries, and lakes, ponds, and glaciers larger than 1 km2

Ille-et-Vilaine (French pronunciation: ​[i.l‿e.vi.lɛn]; Breton: Il-ha-Gwilen) is a department of France, located in the region of Brittany in the northwest of the country.

Ille-et-Vilaine is one of the original 83 departments created during the French Revolution on March 4, 1790. It was created from part of the province of Brittany.

Ille-et-Vilaine is a part of the current region of Brittany and is bordered by the departments of Manche to the north-east, Mayenne to the east, Maine-et-Loire to the south-east, Loire-Atlantique to the south, Morbihan to the south-west, and Côtes-d'Armor to the west and north-west. Also the English Channel (la Manche in French) borders the department to the north.

The department is named after its two main rivers, the Ille and the Vilaine, whose confluence is in Rennes, the capital of the department and of the region. Other important rivers include :

The department is moderately elevated above the level of the sea, with many hills; however the central part has a dense network of many tributaries to the Ille or the Vilaine from all around the large basin of Rennes. The elevated hills bordering this basin are covered by several old forests now exploited by men for the production of wood. The basin itself is a rich agriculture area, as well as the north-west of the department near the Rance.

In the extreme south of the department the Vilaine goes through a slower decrease in elevation in a small corridor in the area of the city of Redon; in this area, the Vilaine is known for its frequent floods during its recent history, often because of too-intensive draining of agricultural areas around Rennes (some floods also affected some parts of Rennes up to the 1980s due to incorrect management of old equipment of the canal of Ille-et-Rance). To avoid these hazards within inhabited cities, some natural fields bordering the Vilaine in the south of the department are now left floodable, and works for regulating the level have been done including, small artificial lakes with derivation channels, replanting trees in the basin, better management of forests, and regulating the artificial drains made for agriculture.

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Wikipedia