The arrondissement of La Rochelle is an arrondissement of France, in the Charente-Maritime department, Nouvelle-Aquitaine region. Its capital, and the prefecture of the department, is the city of La Rochelle.
When the Charente-Maritime department was created on 1790, the arrondissement of La Rochelle was part of that original department.[2]
The arrondissement of La Rochelle is the smallest of the arrondissements of the Charente-Maritime department but the one with more people living in it. It has an area of 817.7 km2 (315.7 sq mi),[3] and a population of 210,151 inhabitants for a density of 257.0 inhabitants/km².[4]
La Rochelle is the northernmost arrondissement of the department. It is formed from the old province of Aunis, with centre in La Rochelle, its historical capital.
It is bordered to the north by the Vendée department, to the east by the Deux-Sèvres department, to the south by the arrondissement of Rochefort, and the Atlantic Ocean to the west.
After the reorganisation of the cantons in France,[5] cantons are not subdivisions of the arrondissements so they could have communes that belong to different arrondissements.
In the arrondissement of La Rochelle, there are only two cantons where not all their "communes" are in the arrondissement: the Châtelaillon-Plage and La Jarrie cantons. The following table shows the distribution of the "communes" in the cantons and arrondissements:
The arrondissement of La Rochelle has 58 communes; they are (with their INSEE codes):[6]
The communes with more inhabitants in the arrondissement are:
46°10′N 1°10′W / 46.167°N 1.167°W / 46.167; -1.167