Grenland

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Grenland district, Telemark, Norway.

Grenland is a traditional district in the county of Telemark, Norway.

It is the core of a slightly larger traditional district known as Nedre Telemark ("Lower Telemark"), which also encompasses nearby coastal municipalities in the Vestmar district.

In the early Viking Age, before Harald Fairhair, Grenland was a petty kingdom.

[edit] Metropolitan Grenland

Grenland is also the name of a metropolitan region in the area. The largest cities are Skien and Porsgrunn.

Municipality	Population	Area^[1]	Density^[2]
Skien	50,507	719	70
Porsgrunn	33,323	161	207
Bamble	14,163	282	50
Siljan	2,349	202	12
Total	100,342	1,364	74

During the period of the municipality mergers in Norway, the chief administrative officer (fylkesmann) in Telemark proposed that the municipalities Skien, Solum, Gjerpen, Porsgrunn, Eidanger and Brevik be merged to form a large urban municipality centered around Skien. The municipalities had been closely integrated since the establishment of the Hydro factory at Herøya, and conurbation between the settlements was also significant.

However, the idea was opposed by Solum as well as Porsgrunn, Eidanger and Brevik and soon fell out of grace. Eidanger proposed a merger with Brevik and Porsgrunn, and the enlarged Porsgrunn municipality was finally created on 1 January 1964. Brevik lost its city status in the process. In light of this merger, the central authorities saw only one possible solution; a similar merger between Solum, Gjerpen and Skien. Unlike the first proposal, this was met by protests from Gjerpen - to no avail, as the case went to the Norwegian Parliament. The result was a significantly enlarged Skien municipality. On 1 January 1968 an area from the old Gjerpen and Solum municipalities with 3,554 inhabitants was moved to Porsgrunn.

In addition, the urban municipalities Langesund and Stathelle was incorporated into the rural municipality Bamble. Like Brevik, both Langesund and Stathelle lost their city status. Siljan municipality remained unaffected by the mergers, contrary to the initial expectations.