Everything about Mancunian totally explained
Manchester (; ) is a
city and
metropolitan borough of
Greater Manchester,
England. Manchester was granted
city status in 1853. It has a population of 452,000, and lies at the centre of the wider
Greater Manchester Urban Area, which has a population of 2,240,230, the
United Kingdom's
third largest conurbation. Manchester has the second
largest urban zone in the UK and the fourteenth most populated in Europe.
Forming part of the
English Core Cities Group, often described as the
second city of the UK, and the "
Capital of the
North", Manchester today is a centre of the
arts, the
media,
higher education and
commerce. In a poll of British business leaders published in 2006, Manchester was regarded as the best place in the UK to locate a business. A report commissioned by Manchester Partnership, published in 2007, showed Manchester to be the "fastest-growing city" economically. It is the third most visited city in the United Kingdom by foreign visitors. Manchester was the host of the
2002 Commonwealth Games, and among its other sporting connections are its two
Premier League football teams,
Manchester United and
Manchester City.
Historically, most of the city was a part of
Lancashire, with areas south of the
River Mersey being in
Cheshire. Manchester was the world's first
industrialised city and played a central role during the
Industrial Revolution. It was the dominant international centre of
textile manufacture and
cotton spinning. During the 19th century it acquired the nickname
Cottonopolis,
History
Toponymy
The name Manchester originates from the
Ancient Roman name
Mamucium, thought to be a
Latinisation of an original
Celtic name (possibly meaning "breast-like hill" from
mamm- = "breast"), plus
Anglo-Saxon ceaster = "town", which is derived from
Latin castra = "camp".
Manchester is also the
10th most common place name in the United States.
Early history
There are few signs of
prehistoric occupation of the city. The only major
Bronze Age finds have been to the south, where the remains of an extensive farming community were discovered during the construction of
Manchester Airport's second runway.
The
Brigantes were the major
Celtic tribe of what is now
Northern England whom had a stronghold in the locality at a sandstone outcrop on which
Manchester Cathedral now stands, opposite the banks of the
River Irwell. Their territory extended across the fertile lowland of what is now
Salford and
Stretford. Following the
Roman conquest of Britain in the 1st century,
General Agricola ordered the construction of a
Roman fort in the year 79 named
Mamucium to ensure Roman interests with
Deva Victrix (
Chester) and
Eboracum (
York) were protected from the Brigantes. A stabilised fragment of foundations of the final version of the Roman fort is visible in
Castlefield. The Romans withdrew in the early 5th century, and by the time of the
Norman Conquest in 1066 the focus of settlement had shifted to the confluence of the rivers Irwell and
Irk. Much of the wider area was laid waste in the subsequent
Harrying of the North.
Thomas de la Warre, lord of the manor, founded and constructed a collegiate church for the
parish in 1421. The church is now
Manchester Cathedral; the domestic premises of the college now house
Chetham's School of Music and
Chetham's Library. Manchester became an important centre for the manufacture and trade of
woollens and
linen, and by about 1540, had expanded to become, in
John Leland's words, "The fairest, best builded, quickest, and most populous town of all Lancashire."
Significant quantities of
cotton began to be used after about 1600, firstly in linen/cotton
fustians, but by around 1750 pure cotton fabrics were being produced and cotton had overtaken wool in importance. and later the world's largest marketplace for cotton goods. Manchester was dubbed "
Cottonopolis" and "Warehouse City" during the
Victorian era. It developed a wide range of industries, so that by 1835 "Manchester was without challenge the first and greatest industrial city in the world."
The
Manchester Ship Canal was created by canalisation of the Rivers Irwell and Mersey for from
Salford to the Mersey estuary. This enabled ocean going ships to sail right into the Port of Manchester. On the canal's banks, just outside the borough, the world's first industrial estate was created at
Trafford Park. The first
Trades Union Congress was held in Manchester (at the Mechanics' Institute, David Street), from 2 to
6 June 1868. Manchester was also an important cradle of the
Labour Party and the
Suffragette Movement.
At that time, it seemed a place in which anything could happen—new industrial processes, new ways of thinking (the
Manchester School, promoting
free trade and
laissez-faire), new classes or groups in society, new religious sects, and new forms of labour organisation. It attracted educated visitors from all parts of Britain and Europe. A saying capturing this sense of innovation survives today: "What Manchester does today, the rest of the world does tomorrow." Manchester's golden age was perhaps the last quarter of the 19th century. Many of the great public buildings (including the Town Hall) date from then. The city's cosmopolitan atmosphere contributed to a vibrant culture, which included the
Hallé Orchestra. In 1889, when county councils were created in
England, the municipal borough became a
county borough with even greater autonomy.
Although the Industrial Revolution brought wealth to the city, it also brought poverty and squalor to a large part of the population. Historian
Simon Schama noted that "Manchester was the very best and the very worst taken to terrifying extremes, a new kind of city in the world; the chimneys of industrial suburbs greeting you with columns of smoke". An American visitor taken to Manchester’s blackspots saw “wretched, defrauded, oppressed, crushed human nature, lying and bleeding fragments”.
The number of
cotton mills in Manchester itself reached a peak of 108 in 1853.
Manchester Cathedral was among the buildings seriously damaged; its restoration took 20 years.
Cotton processing and trading continued to fall in peacetime, and the exchange closed in 1968. and employed over 3,000 men, but the canal was unable to handle the increasingly large
container ships. Traffic declined, and the port closed in 1982. Heavy industry suffered a downturn from the 1960s and was greatly reduced during the economic reforms associated with
Margaret Thatcher's government (for example 1979 onwards). Manchester lost 150,000 jobs in manufacturing between 1961 and 1983. The final insurance payout was over £400 million; many affected businesses never recovered from the loss of trade.
Redevelopment
Spurred by the investment after the 1996 bomb, and aided by the
XVII Commonwealth Games, Manchester's city centre has undergone extensive regeneration. New and renovated complexes such as
The Printworks and the Triangle have become popular shopping and entertainment destinations. The
Manchester Arndale is the UK's largest city centre shopping mall.
Large sections of the city dating from the 1960s have been either demolished and re-developed or modernised with the use of glass and steel. Old mills have been converted into modern apartments,
Hulme has undergone extensive regeneration programmes, and million-pound lofthouse apartments have since been developed. The 169-metre tall, 47-storey
Beetham Tower, completed in 2006, is the tallest building in the UK outside London and the highest residential accommodation in western Europe. The lower 23 floors form the Hilton Hotel, featuring a "sky bar" on the 23rd floor. Its upper 24 floors are apartments. In January 2007, the independent Casino Advisory Panel awarded Manchester a licence to build the only
supercasino in the UK to regenerate the Eastlands area of the city, but in March the
House of Lords rejected the decision by three votes rendering previous
House of Commons acceptance meaningless. This left the supercasino, and 14 other smaller concessions, in parliamentary limbo until a final decision was made. On
11 July 2007, a source close to the government declared the entire supercasino project "dead in the water". A member of the Manchester Chamber of Commerce professed himself "amazed and a bit shocked" and that "there has been an awful lot of time and money wasted". After a meeting with the Prime Minister, Manchester City Council issued a press release on
24 July 2007 stating that "contrary to some reports the door isn't closed to a regional casino". The supercasino was officially declared dead in February 2008 with a compensation package described by the media as "rehashed plans, spin and empty promises."
Second City
Manchester has recently been regarded by the international press, British public, and government ministers as being the
second city of the United Kingdom. A 2007 poll by the
BBC placed it ahead of Birmingham and
Liverpool in the category of second city of England, but also ahead in the category of
third city. Neither categories are officially sanctioned, and criteria for determining what 'second city' means are ill-defined. Manchester isn't the second
largest city in size or
population, but it's argued that cultural and
historical criteria are more important. The BBC reports that redevelopment of recent years has heightened claims that Manchester is the second city of the UK. This title however, which is unofficial in the UK, has traditionally been held by
Birmingham since the early 20th century.
Governance
Manchester is represented by three tiers of government,
Manchester City Council ("local"), UK Parliament ("national"), and European Parliament ("Europe").
Greater Manchester County Council administration was abolished in 1986, and so the
city council is effectively a
unitary authority. Since its inception in 1995, Manchester has been a member of the
English Core Cities Group, which, amongst other things, serves to promote the social, cultural and economic status of the city at an international level.
The town of Manchester was granted a charter by Thomas Grelley in 1301 but lost its
borough status in a court case of 1359. Until the 19th century, local government was largely provided by manorial courts, the last of which ended in 1846.
From
a very early time, the township of Manchester lay within the
historic county boundaries of
Lancashire. It was this separation that resulted in Salford becoming the judicial seat of
Salfordshire, which included the
ancient parish of Manchester. Manchester later formed its own
Poor Law Union by the name of Manchester. The
River Mersey flows through the south of Manchester. Much of the inner city, especially in the south, is flat, offering extensive views from many highrise buildings in the city of the foothills and moors of the Pennines, which can often be capped with snow in the winter months. Manchester's geographic features were highly influential in its early development as the world's first industrial city. These features are its climate, its proximity to a
seaport at
Liverpool, the availability of water power from its rivers, and its nearby
coal reserves.
The name Manchester, though officially applied only to the metropolitan district of Greater Manchester, has been applied to other, wider divisions of land, particularly across much of the Greater Manchester county and urban area. The "Manchester City Zone", "
Manchester post town" and the "
Manchester Congestion Charge" are all examples of this. The economic geography of the Manchester City Region is used to define housing markets, business linkages, travel to work patterns, administrative areas etc. As defined by
The Northern Way economic development agency the City Region territory encompasses most of the natural economy’s
Travel to Work Area and includes the cities of Manchester and
Salford, plus the adjoining metropolitan boroughs of
Metropolitan Borough of Stockport,
Tameside,
Trafford,
Bolton,
Bury,
Oldham,
Rochdale and
Wigan, together with
High Peak (which lies outside the
North West England region),
Congleton,
Macclesfield,
Vale Royal and
Warrington.
For purposes of the
Office for National Statistics, Manchester forms the most populous settlement within the
Greater Manchester Urban Area, the United Kingdom's third largest conurbation. There is a mixture of high-density urban and suburban locations in Manchester. The largest open space in the city, at around, is
Heaton Park. Manchester is contiguous on all sides with several large settlements, except for a small section along its southern boundary with
Cheshire. The
M60 and
M56 motorways pass through the south of Manchester, through
Northenden and
Wythenshawe respectively. Heavy rail lines enter the city from all directions, the principal destination being
Manchester Piccadilly station.
Manchester experiences a
temperate maritime climate, like much of the
British Isles, with relatively cool summers and mild winters. There is regular but generally light precipitation throughout the year. The city's average annual rainfall is compared to the UK average of, and its mean rain days are 140.4 per annum, notably the
A62 road via
Oldham and
Standedge, the
A57 (
Snake Pass) towards
Sheffield, and the
M62 over
Saddleworth Moor.
Demography
| Manchester compared |
| UK Census 2001 |
Manchester |
Greater Manchester |
England |
| Total population |
441,200 |
2,547,700 |
49,138,831 |
| Foreign born |
15.0% |
7.2% |
9.2% |
| White |
81.0% |
91.0% |
91.0% |
| Asian |
9.1% |
5.7% |
4.6% |
| Black |
4.5% |
1.2% |
2.3% |
| Over 75 years old |
6.4% |
7.0% |
7.5% |
| Christian |
62.4% |
74% |
72% |
| Muslim |
9.1% |
5.0% |
3.1% |
The
United Kingdom Census 2001 showed a total resident population for Manchester of 392,819, a 9.2% decline from the 1991 census. Approximately 83,000 were aged under 16, 285,000 were aged 16–74, and 25,000 aged 75 and over. Historically the population of Manchester only began to rapidly increase during the Victorian era and peaked at 766,311 in 1931. After the peak the population began to decrease rapidly, reasons cited for this are
slum clearance and the increased building of
social housing overspill estates by Manchester City Council after
WWII such as
Hattersley and
Langley.
The inhabitants of Manchester, like in many other large cities, are religiously diverse. The
Jewish population is second only to London in the UK, and it also has one of the largest
Muslim populations in
Greater Manchester. Manchester's Palace Hotel hosted the 2007 Lloyds TSB's Northern Jewel Awards, where leaders of the Asian community in the north of the UK were recognised.
The city is also home to one of the UK's largest gay populations with
Canal Street, a
gay village, located close to
Piccadilly station. The percentage of the population in Manchester who reported themselves as being in a same-sex relationship was 0.44%, compared to the English national average of 0.20%.
In terms of
districts by ethnic diversity, the City of Manchester is ranked highest in Greater Manchester and 34th in England. 2005 estimates state 77.6% people as '
White' (71.0% of residents as
White British, 3.0%
White Irish, 3.6% as
Other White - although those of mixed white European and British ancestry is unknown, there are over 25,000 Mancunians of
Italian descent alone which represents 5.5% of the city's population). 3.2% as
Mixed race (1.3% Mixed White and Black Caribbean, 0.6% Mixed White and Black African, 0.7% Mixed White and Asian, 0.7% Other Mixed). 10.3% of the city's population are
South Asian (2.3%
Indian, 5.8%
Pakistani, 1.0%
Bangladeshi, 1.2%
Other South Asian). 5.2% are
Black (2.0%
Black Caribbean, 2.7%
Black African and 0.5%
Other Black). 2.3% of the city's population are
Chinese, and 1.4% are
another ethnic group. Kidd identifies
Moss Side,
Longsight,
Cheetham Hill,
Rusholme, as centres of population for ethnic minorities. There is also a well-established
Chinatown in the city with a substantial number of oriental restaurants and Chinese supermarkets. The area also attracts large numbers of Chinese students to the city, attending the two universities.
Based on the population estimates for 2005, crime levels in the city are considerably higher than the national average. Some parts of Manchester have been adversely affected by its recent rapid
urbanisation, resulting in high levels of crime in areas such as Moss Side and
Wythenshawe. The number of theft from a vehicle offences and theft of a vehicle per 1,000 of the population was 25.5 and 8.9 compared to the English national average of 7.6 and 2.9 respectively. The number of sexual offences was 1.9 compared to the average of 0.9.
Economy
Manchester was at the forefront of the 19th-century Industrial Revolution, and was a leading centre for manufacturing. The city's economy is now largely service-based and, as of 2007, is the fastest growing in the UK, with inward investment second only to the capital. The city was ranked in 2007 as the best place and the eighteenth best in Europe. Manchester has the largest UK office market outside London.
Manchester is a focus for businesses which serve local, regional and international markets.
Manchester is the commercial, educational and cultural focus for
North West England, and is ranked as the fourth biggest retail area in the UK by sales. The city centre retail area contains shops from chain stores up to high-end boutiques such as
Vivienne Westwood,
Emporio Armani, and
DKNY. The city has several shopping malls including the
Manchester Arndale, the UK's largest inner city shopping mall. It has been used in film as a replacement location for the
Palace of Westminster, where filming isn't permitted. Manchester also has a number of
skyscrapers built during the 1960s and 1970s, the tallest of which is the
CIS Tower located near
Manchester Victoria station. The
Beetham Tower, completed in 2006, is an example of the new surge in high-rise building and includes a
Hilton hotel, a restaurant, and apartments. On its completion, it was the tallest building in the UK outside London, although an even taller building, the
Piccadilly Tower, began construction behind
Manchester Piccadilly station in early 2008.
The Green Building, opposite
Oxford Road station, is a pioneering eco-friendly housing project, almost unique in the UK.
In the north of the city borough is the award winning
Heaton Park which is one of the largest municipal parks in Europe covering of parkland. There are a total of 135 parks, gardens and open spaces within the city. Two large squares hold many of Manchester's public monuments. Albert Square has monuments to
Prince Albert,
Bishop James Fraser,
Oliver Heywood,
William Ewart Gladstone and
John Bright.
Piccadilly Gardens has monuments dedicated to
Queen Victoria,
Robert Peel,
James Watt and the
Duke of Wellington. The cenotaph in St Peter's Square, by
Edwin Lutyens, is Manchester's main memorial to its war dead. The
Alan Turing Memorial in
Sackville Park commemorates his role as the father of modern computing. A statue of
Abraham Lincoln by George Gray Barnard in the eponymous Lincoln Square was presented to the city by Mr. and Mrs. Charles Phelps Taft of Cincinnati, Ohio, to mark the part that Lancashire played in the
cotton famine and
American Civil War of 1861–1865. The success of the
2002 Commonwealth Games is commemorated by the
B of the Bang, located near the City of Manchester Stadium in the Eastlands area of the city. At tall, the sculpture is the tallest in the UK. A
Concorde is on display near Manchester Airport.
Transport
Manchester and North West England are served by
Manchester Airport. The airport is the busiest in terms of passenger traffic in the UK outside London, serving 22 million passengers in 2006. Airline service exists to many destinations in Europe, North America, the Caribbean, Africa, the Middle East and Asia (with more destinations from Manchester than from
London Heathrow). A second runway was opened in 2001 and, in conjunction with continued terminal improvements, airport officials believe that will allow growth to 40.7 million passengers by 2015.
Manchester is well served by train. In terms of passengers,
Manchester Piccadilly is the busiest train station in England, outside London. Local operator
Northern Rail operates all over the north of England, and other national operators include
Virgin Trains. The
Liverpool and Manchester Railway was the first passenger railway in the world. Greater Manchester has an extensive countywide railway network, and two mainline stations. Manchester city centre is also serviced by over a dozen rail-based park and ride sites. Manchester became the first city in the UK to acquire a modern
light rail system when the
Manchester Metrolink opened in 1992. An expansion programme is underway. In October 2007, the government announced that a feasibility study had been ordered into increasing the capacity at Piccadilly station and turning Manchester into the rail hub of
the north.
The city has one of the most extensive bus networks outside London with over 50 bus companies operating in the
Greater Manchester region radiating from the city. Prior to the
deregulation of 1986, SELNEC and later GMPTE operated all buses in Manchester. The bus system were then taken over by
GM Buses which after privatisation was split into GM Buses North and GM Buses South and taken over by
First Manchester and
Stagecoach Manchester respectively. First Manchester also operates a three route
zero-fare bus service called
Metroshuttle which carries commuters around Manchester's business districts.
An extensive canal network remains from the Industrial Revolution, nowadays mainly used for leisure. The
Manchester Ship Canal is open, but traffic to the upper reaches is light.
Culture
Arts
Manchester has two
symphony orchestras, the
Hallé Orchestra and the
BBC Philharmonic Orchestra. There is also a
chamber orchestra, the Manchester Camerata. In the 1950s, the city was home to the so-called 'Manchester School' of classical composers, which comprised
Harrison Birtwistle,
Peter Maxwell Davies,
David Ellis and
Alexander Goehr. Manchester is a centre for musical education, with the
Royal Northern College of Music and
Chetham’s School of Music. The main classical venue was the
Free Trade Hall on Peter Street, until the opening in 1996 of the 2,500 seat
Bridgewater Hall.
Manchester’s main pop music venue is the
Manchester Evening News Arena, situated next to
Victoria station. It seats over 21,000, is the largest arena of its type in Europe, and has been voted
International Venue of the Year. In terms of concert goers, it's the busiest indoor arena in the world ahead of
Madison Square Garden in
New York and the
O2 Arena in
London, the second and third busiest respectively. Other major venues include the
Manchester Apollo and the
Manchester Academy. Smaller venues are the Bierkeller, the Roadhouse, and Night and Day Cafe.
Bands that have emerged from the Manchester music scene include
The Smiths, the
Buzzcocks,
The Fall,
Joy Division and its successor group
New Order,
Oasis and
Doves. Manchester was credited as the main regional driving force behind
indie bands of the 1980s including
Happy Mondays,
The Charlatans,
Inspiral Carpets,
James, and
The Stone Roses. These groups came from what became known as the "
Madchester" scene that also centred around the Fac 51 Haçienda (also known as simply
The Haçienda) developed by founder of
factory records Tony Wilson. Although from southern England,
The Chemical Brothers subsequently formed in Manchester. Ex-Stone Roses' frontman
Ian Brown and ex-Smiths
Morrissey continue successful solo careers. Other notable Manchester acts include
Take That and
Simply Red. Greater Manchester natives include
A Guy Called Gerald,
Richard Ashcroft and
Jay Kay of
Jamiroquai. Older Manchester artists include the 1960s band's
The Hollies,
Herman's Hermits and the
Bee Gees who, whilst commonly associated with Australia, grew up in
Chorlton.
Larger venues include the
Manchester Opera House, featuring large-scale touring shows and
West End shows; the
Palace Theatre; the
Royal Exchange Theatre in Manchester’s former cotton exchange; and the
Lowry Centre, a touring venue in Salford. Smaller sites include the
Library Theatre, a producing theatre in the basement of the central library; the
Green Room; the
Contact Theatre; and Studio Salford. The
Dancehouse is dedicated to dance productions.
In the 19th century, Manchester featured in works highlighting the changes that industrialisation had brought to Britain. These included
Elizabeth Gaskell's novel
Mary Barton: A Tale of Manchester Life (1848), and
The Condition of the English Working Class in 1844, written by
Friedrich Engels while living and working in Manchester.
Charles Dickens is reputed to have set his novel
Hard Times in the city, and while it's partly modelled on
Preston, it shows the influence of his friend Elizabeth Gaskell.
Nightlife
The night-time economy of Manchester has expanded significantly since about 1993, with investment from breweries in bars, public houses and clubs, along with active support from the local authorities. with 110– people visiting on a typical weekend night. and supports jobs.
The
Madchester scene of the 1980s, from which groups including
The Stone Roses, the
Happy Mondays,
Inspiral Carpets,
808 State,
James and
The Charlatans emerged, was based around clubs such as
The Hacienda. The period was the subject of the movie
24 Hour Party People. Many of the big clubs suffered problems with organised crime at that time; Haslam describes one where staff were so completely intimidated that free admission and drinks were demanded (and given) and drugs were openly dealt. The TV series
Queer as Folk is set in the area.
Education
There are two
universities in Manchester. The
University of Manchester is the largest full-time non-collegiate university in the United Kingdom and was created in 2004 by the merger of
Victoria University of Manchester and
UMIST. It includes the
Manchester Business School, which offered the first MBA course in the UK in 1965.
Manchester Metropolitan University was formed as Manchester Polytechnic on the merger of three colleges in 1970. It gained university status in 1992, and in the same year absorbed Crewe and Alsager College of Higher Education in South Cheshire.
The University of Manchester, Manchester Metropolitan University and the
Royal Northern College of Music are grouped around Oxford Road on the southern side of the city centre, which forms Europe's largest urban higher education precinct. Together they've a combined population of 73,160 students in
higher education, though almost 6,000 of these were based at Manchester Metropolitan University's campuses at
Crewe and
Alsager in
Cheshire.
One of Manchester's most notable secondary schools is the
Manchester Grammar School. Established in 1515, as a free
grammar school next to what is now the Cathedral, it moved in 1931 to Old Hall Lane in Fallowfield, south Manchester, to accommodate the growing student body. In the post-war period, it was a
direct-grant grammar school (for example partially state funded), but it reverted to independent status in 1976 after abolition of the direct-grant system. Its previous premises are now used by
Chetham's School of Music. There are two schools nearby:
Withington Girls' School and
Manchester High School for Girls.
Sport
Manchester is well-known for being a city of sport. Two
Premiership football clubs bear the city's name,
Manchester City and
Manchester United. Manchester City's ground is at the
City of Manchester Stadium (48,000 capacity); Manchester United's
Old Trafford ground, the largest club football ground in the United Kingdom, with a capacity of 76,000, and England's only UEFA-rated 5-star stadium, is just outside the city, in the borough of
Trafford.
Lancashire County Cricket Club's ground is also in Trafford.
The
City of Manchester Stadium was built for the 2002 Commonwealth Games. After the games, one of the stands was replaced in preparation for
Manchester City's arrival in 2003. The stadium holds 48,000 fans all-seated, and is one of the largest football stadiums in England. It has hosted the
2008 UEFA Cup Final. Old Trafford is the only club football ground in England to have hosted the
UEFA Champions League Final, in
2003. It is also the venue of the
Super League Grand Final in
Rugby League.
First class sporting facilities were built for the
2002 Commonwealth Games, including the
City of Manchester Stadium, the
National Squash Centre and the
Manchester Aquatics Centre. Manchester has competed twice to host the
Olympic Games, beaten by
Atlanta for 1996 and
Sydney for 2000. The
Manchester Velodrome was built as a part of the bid for the 2000 games. It hosted the
UCI Track Cycling World Championships for the third time in 2008. Various sporting arenas around the city will be used as training facilities by athletes preparing for the
2012 Olympics in London. The
MEN Arena hosted the
FINA World Swimming Championships in 2008. Manchester will also host the World Squash Championships in 2008.
Media
ITV franchisee
Granada Television has its headquarters in Quay Street, in the Castlefield area of the city. Granada produces the world's oldest and most watched television soap opera,
Coronation Street, which is screened five times a week on
ITV1. Local news and programmes for the north-west region are produced in Manchester.
Manchester is one of the three main
BBC bases in England, and
Real Story, are made at New Broadcasting House on Oxford Road, just south of the city centre. The hit series
Cutting It was set in the city's Northern Quarter and ran on
BBC1 for five series.
Life on Mars was set in 1973 Manchester. Also,
The Street, winner of a
BAFTA and
International Emmy Award in 2007 is set in Manchester. The first edition of
Top of the Pops was broadcast from a converted church in
Longsight on New Year's Day 1964. Manchester is also the regional base for the
BBC One North West Region so programmes like
North West Tonight are produced here. The BBC intends to relocate large numbers of staff and facilities from London to Media City at
Salford Quays. The Children's (
CBBC), Comedy, Sport (
BBC Sport) and New Media departments are all scheduled to move before 2010. Manchester has its own television channel,
Channel M, owned by the
Guardian Media Group and operated since 2000. Student radio stations include Fuse FM at the University of Manchester and MMU Radio at the Manchester Metropolitan University. A
community radio network is coordinated by Radio Regen, with stations covering the South Manchester communities of
Ardwick,
Longsight and
Levenshulme (
All FM 96.9) and
Wythenshawe (Wythenshawe FM 97.2). Defunct radio stations include Sunset (which became)
Kiss 102 (now Galaxy), and KFM which became Signal Cheshire (now
Imagine FM). These stations, as well as
pirate radio, played a significant role in the city's
House music culture, also known as the
Madchester scene, which was based around clubs like
The Haçienda which had its own show on Kiss 102. Radio producer and author
Karl Pilkington, of
The Ricky Gervais Show fame, is from Manchester.
Manchester is also featured in several
Hollywood films such as
My Son, My Son! (1940), directed by
Charles Vidor and starring
Brian Aherne and
Louis Hayward. Also
Grand Hotel (1932), in which
Wallace Beery often shouts "Manchester!". Others include
Velvet Goldmine starring
Ewan McGregor, and
Sir Alec Guinness's
The Man in the White Suit. More recently, the entire city of Manchester is engulfed in runaway fires in the 2002 film
28 Days Later. The city is also home to the Manchester International Film Festival and has held the Commonwealth film festival.
The Guardian newspaper was founded in Manchester in 1821 as
The Manchester Guardian. Its head office is still in Manchester, though many of its management functions were moved to London in 1964. The
Metro North West is available free at
Metrolink stops, rail stations and other busy locations. The MEN group distributes several local weekly free papers. For many years most of the national newspapers had offices in Manchester:
The Daily Telegraph,
Daily Express,
Daily Mail,
The Daily Mirror,
The Sun. Only
The Daily Sport remains based in Manchester. At its height, journalists were employed, though in the 1980s office closures began and today the "second Fleet Street" is no more. An attempt to launch a Northern daily newspaper, the
North West Times, employing journalists made redundant by other titles, closed in 1988. There are several local lifestyle magazines, including
YQ Magazine and
Moving Manchester.
Twin cities and consulates
Manchester has formal
twinning arrangements (or "friendship agreements") with several places. In addition, the
British Council maintains a metropolitan centre in Manchester. Although not an official twin city,
Tampere,
Finland is known as
"the Manchester of Finland" – or
"Manse" for short.
Manchester is home to the largest group of
consuls in the UK outside London. The expansion of international trade links during the industrial revolution led to the introduction of the first consuls in the 1820s and since then over 800, from all parts of the world, have been based in Manchester. Manchester has remained (in consular terms at least) the second city of the UK for two centuries, and hosts consular services for most of the north of England. The reduction in the amount of local paperwork required for modern international trade is partly offset by the increased number of international travellers. Many pass through Manchester Airport, easily the UK’s biggest and busiest airport outside the London area.
- Australian Honorary Consul
- Assistant High Commissioner for Bangladesh
- Consulate General of the Peoples Republic of China
- High Commission for Cyprus
- Trade Commission of Denmark
- Consulate of France
- Consulate of Italy
- Consulate of the Netherlands
- Royal Norwegian Consulate
- Consulate General of Pakistan
- Consulate General of Portugal
- Consulate General of Spain
- Consulate of Sweden
- Consulate of Switzerland
|
Further Information
Get more info on 'Mancunian'.
|
External Link Exchanges
Do you know how hard it is to get a link from a large encyclopaedia? Well we're different and will prove it. To get a link from us just add the following HTML to your site on a relevant page:
<a href="http://manchester.totallyexplained.com">Manchester Totally Explained</a>
Then simply click through this link from your web page. Our crawlers will verify your link, extract the title of your web page and instantly add a link back to it. If you like you can remove the words Totally Explained and embed the link in article text.
As long as your link remains in place, we'll keep our link to you right here. Please play fair - our crawlers are watching. Your site must be closely related to this one's topic. Any kind of spamming, dubious practises or removing the link will result in your link from us being dropped and, potentially, your whole site being banned. |
