Fortis or long consonants in general are more stable than in other dialects—'to swim' is always , whereas it is pronounced with only a short in other dialects. This is probably because in stressed words, short vowels only appear before double or geminated/long consonants. Hence, a word like is not possible in Basel German. As in other dialects, the difference between fortis and lenis is in length. Pilch (180) however interprets as alveolar, not long. Fortis consonants may also be transcribed , since lenis are often transcribed as .
