City Status 2012

[Dai.]

In all honesty, many places in the UK could do with being cities for tourism purposes and just a general regeneration, I doubt I could point out all of the ones that could do with being cities but I will look forward to hearing about who ends up in the race!

I mean Newport, (S. Wales) has had no end of regeneration and extra tourism since it was made a city and now with the Ryder Cup!

 

[LE Greys]

Berney Arms, just to be different.

 

[thefab444]

but you won't find a cultural... presence in the same league

Good!

 

[NLC1072]

Berney Arms, just to be different.

I like it!

 

[Ivo]

Reading has to be, to be honest. It is the only town in England to have many things usually associated with cities, such as a 200,000+ population (although the Borough is only about 140k), an 011x STD code, a 10M+ station, and more. Rochester should be granted City Status once again, but not in conjunction with Chatham etc (The City of The Medway Towns? Huh?), while I think Croydon has a good shout as well. As for outside England, I think Dumfries would make a good candidate for City Status, and also Aberystwyth; neither will probably apply though. Otherwise, I would like to see Southend become a city, but it just doesn't feel like one. The only seaside resort that even remotely does, besides Brighton, is Bournemouth.

And lastly, MK has a good shout - but the day a New Town becomes a city... [even if it was designed as Britain's only New City]

 

[Lampshade]

Blackburn? Seriously?

I'd go for Middlesborough.

 

[MidnightFlyer]

Blackburn? Seriously?

I'd go for Middlesborough.

And what does Middlesbrough have over Blackburn?

 

[4SRKT]

And what does Middlesbrough have over Blackburn?

Nothing. It's like being asked to choose between diarrhoea and constipation.

 

[MidnightFlyer]

I will admit to not being Blackburn's Number 1 fan, but I've been to Middlesbrough, and frankly it made me appreciate where I live, because it made me realise it can get so much worse than East Lancashire

 

[thefab444]

worse than East Lancashire

Christ, it must be bad then!

 

[paul1609]

As teenager wearing a pompey shirt I remember being welcomed in to pubs within spitting distance of ewood park, come to that same applied at roker park. Sadly at middlesbrough I got my f***ING head kicked in ;-(

 

[MidnightFlyer]

Christ, it must be bad then!

Its OK if you're local (such as oneself) but must be a bit tacky should you come from a nice area of Britain (such as the New Forest). I'm not saying round here is the first place I would live, but its definately nicer than Redcar, Middlesbrough etc
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As teenager wearing a pompey shirt I remember being welcomed in to pubs within spitting distance of ewood park(

There's enough of them . No, we try to be friendly up here, but a lot of pub are now 'Rovers only' or 'Home Fans only' sadly.

 

[thefab444]

Its OK if you're local (such as oneself) but must be a bit tacky should you come from a nice area of Britain (such as the New Forest). I'm not saying round here is the first place I would live, but its definately nicer than Redcar, Middlesbrough etc

Civilization ends north of the Oxfordshire border.

 

[MidnightFlyer]

Civilization ends north of the Oxfordshire border.

Strange, up here we say it ends south of Wigan and north of Barrow

 

[smudge.efc]

I'm not normally one to moan about which place is better, but my god Middlesbrough is a grim place. Having just finished at Durham uni, spent a bit of time on the Stockton campus which is bout 10 minutes from Boro and it's genuinely soul destroying, it's as if people have no hope in making something of themselves. Saying that, becoming a city could therefore be the catalyst for Boro getting some investment and kicking on.

 

[43021HST]

Reading has to be, to be honest. It is the only town in England to have many things usually associated with cities, such as a 200,000+ population (although the Borough is only about 140k), an 011x STD code, a 10M+ station, and more.

I thought to be a city, you have to have three things, a university, a thriving financial district and a cathedral, Reading does not have a cathedral, unless a certain business man who has been investing in projects for Reading for ages decides to build one.

 

[thefab444]

In the good olde days a cathedral was what distinguished cities; hence why small towns without a university or "thriving financial district" like Wells, St David's, Ely, Ripon etc. are cities. Many modern cities do not have cathedrals.

 

[4SRKT]

How many places have a 'thriving financial district' these days? Bradford is a city, and it doesn't have a thriving anything. York is a city and doesn't have a financial district of any description, unless you count Parliament Street 'cos it's got a couple of banks in it.

 

[Greenback]

Swansea doesn't have a cathedral, nor a thriving financial district, but it does have a University! In fact, it has two!

It also has a lot of car thieves, a lot of drug addicts, a lot of drunks, a lot of beggars, and allegedly, some 'ladies of the night'.

Despite this it was granted city status in 1969!

 

[Ivo]

Swansea doesn't have a cathedral, nor a thriving financial district, but it does have a University! In fact, it has two!

It also has a lot of car thieves, a lot of drug addicts, a lot of drunks, a lot of beggars, and allegedly, some 'ladies of the night'.

Despite this it was granted city status in 1969!

Indeed. Reading also has two Universities (okay, one is joint with Slough and Ealing), but it also has a well-developed central business area. In fact, the council were so annoyed at not winning in 2002 (it might have been the 2000 one) that they replaced every sign saying "Town Centre" with one saying "City Centre"!

As thefab444 points out, the only thing that has ever determined a city was the presence of a cathedral. However, this only really applies to those which have been cities for centuries, or since "Time Immemorial" as it is known (by all accounts approximately the end of the Tudor period). These days, some cities which have been cities due to the presence of a cathedral either are no longer cities (well done to Rochester, which would have been celebrating its 800th anniversary as a city next year if they'd done things properly when merging with the rest of the Medway Towns in 1998), or no longer have a cathedral (such as Bath).

These days, city status is a bit of a gimme; thus, it would be reasonable to expect that Britain's only 200,000+ town should be given city status. Not to mention that, as things stand, there are no cities on the A4 at all between its original termini (London/Westminster and Bath)!

 

[40fan]

I already live in a city, Stoke-on-Trent, and it is very confusing.

2010 is the centenary of Stoke-on-Trent, but the centenary of the City of Stoke-on-Trent will be in 2025.

Stoke-on-Trent is made up of six towns, unless you are Arnold Bennett. The centre of the six towns is Stoke itself, Stoke-upon-Trent which gave it's name to the whole city. Except the city council insist on calling Hanley the city centre when it is not, it is the shopping centre.

99.9% of people at Stoke station who ask me for the city centre want to go to Stoke.

Even more confusion arises on the local train from Stafford, passengers unfamiliar with the area have been known to alight at Stone, mishearing the announcement as Stoke.

I think Stoke-on-Trent was the first city in the UK which did not have a cathedral. An attempt was made a few years ago to have the parish church promoted to cathedral status, but it was not possible because Stoke is not the seat of a bishop.

The church eventually became a Minster and since no one knew how to go about changing from a parish church to a Minster someone decided to ask the man in charge who is the Bishop of Lichfield.

All that needed to be done was to obtain a letter from him declaring the church to be a Minster.