ZURICH. Tuesday stays under high fog on the north side of the Alps, with a brisk bise and afternoon highs around 8 degrees, MeteoSwiss said in its forecast for 3 November. Switzerland sits on the southern edge of a high centred over Scotland. That pattern means grey lowland, wind from the northeast, and sun only once you are above the cloud. It is a colder, windier version of Monday, not a new weather system.
On the northern side, and in the north and centre of Graubünden, the cloud is high fog or fog-like low cloud, with a top between 1,500 and 2,000 metres. Some breaks are possible during the day. Outside the fog it is sunny. The morning is fresh. The afternoon does not offer much relief: about 8 degrees, with a lively bise. Western Switzerland and Valais are in the same deck, though the Geneva region has a better chance of afternoon breaks. Highs there are 8 to 10 degrees, and the bise on Lake Geneva is strong.
South of the Alps, and the commute
The south, and the Engadin, start sunny. In the afternoon, cloud fields thicken from the south and the sky is often overcast. Highs are around 13 degrees, the mildest readings in the country. Anyone crossing the Gotthard or dropping into Ticino leaves the grey behind for a while, then meets a different cloud, higher and later in the day.
The hazard on the roads is visibility and a side wind, not a storm and not widespread ice in the cities. High fog on the A1 and a strong bise on exposed viaducts are the reasons to leave extra time. Daylight is short. The useful check before a dawn drive is whether the fog top sits on the pass you actually use, because 1,500 metres and 2,000 metres are different journeys. Monday’s official note already had the plateau at 6 to 9 degrees under a lid that could reach 2,000 metres. Tuesday lifts the wind more than it lifts the temperature.
What the rest of the week looks like
The pattern is a stubborn one. A high over the British Isles does not move just because the calendar says November. Until it shifts, the plateau should plan on single-digit afternoons, a bise, and sun that belongs to the peaks and to the south rather than to Zurich, Bern or Basel. Western Switzerland may see the deck break locally, especially near Geneva. That is a gap, not a clearance of the whole Mittelland.
For anyone heating a house this week, the forecast is also a fuel story. Heating oil was the largest single push in October’s inflation print. A grey Tuesday at 8 degrees does not, by itself, change a price. It is the weather in which that price gets paid. Dress for the fog, not for the postcard above it.