Wigan. It gets sucked into the gravitational pull of two cities, Liverpool and Manchester. There's pockets of countryside inbetween Manchester and Wigan, and many many from Wigan claim to live in just "Wigan". Yes, vast amounts of people commute from here to Manchester, but vast amounts commute from here to Liverpool too.

It adds a "stretched hunchback" onto the map of Greater Manchester and is by far the GM town furthest away from the actual city centre (15 or so miles!)


On the other hand, without it, GM's population would plummet by 0.3 million, and we'd have no chance of beating West Midland's population and claiming fame as "second city" in the near future. If we cancelled Wigan out, we would still have a thin chain of urbanity (Tyldesley, Leigh, Atherton) crawling out until we reach Wigan (even though it's not a solid block of urbanness), which would be rather messy.

It's a difficult one, and I myself can't actually decide. Wigan would suit to be a commuter/dormitory town like Preston, Blackburn, Macclesfield and Warrington, but ideally we want it part of GM so we can carry on claiming GM's population is "nearly 3 million".

Your views?

Places do not get added to metropolitan counties so people like you can claim the place is bigger than somewhere up the road.

FWIW - only 80k people live within the town of Wigan (from the 300k in the MBC).

All authority boundaries are artificial, including GM.

FWIW we are wear we are and Wigna was the home of AGMA - I presume the home of GMCA and shares in things like the £1.5bn transport fund.

No one in Wigan (town or MBC) would ever say that they are part of a city called Manchester - they are not. But just like the towns (not MBC) of Bolton and Rochdale they are very close to the economic lump that is Manchester as such there are strong ties between those Lancs towns and between those Lancs towns and the Manchester economic lump.

Your question could equally be asked 'Should Trafford be part of GM?' - it is very different politically - always Tory and being in or our of a local authority means a lot less than you seem to be trying to make out.

Leigh is firmly in the Manchester Urban Area, Wigan is delibertley seperated by a line of greenbelt known as the 'Greenheart', so half of the Borough is in Manchester and half isnt. Would it really be practical to split it in half? Previously it served as the de-facto capital of South Lancashire and when it joined GM the axis shifted towards Preston as the undisputed centre and a conflict between Ormskirk and Skem for where south lancashire adminstration should be (the councils split 50/50 between the two towns).

The Romans thought so, Coccium (Wigan) was a 'gateway' fort to Mamucium (Manchester) on the road between Walton-le-Dale/Preston and Wilderspool/Northwich.

Personally, I've always though a South Lancashire Unitary Authority encompassing Wigan, Skelmersdale, St Helens, and perhaps even Warrington, would provide a counter balance to the other nearby city regions.

But why do we need counter balances or whatever?

Surely the idea is to organise our politics in a manner that works as well as possible for the local people.

As it has worked out, Wigan is in with the largest economic urban area in the north of the country which will lead to infrastructure considerations in that economic area being impacted by the views of those in Wigan. The alternative of not being in GM would simply mean that their views on how money and infrastructure in GM should be spent and developed would be ignored.

I really cannot see any negatives from the point of view of a resident of Wigan MBC.

I don't think you could really call Preston, Blackburn, Macclesfield and Warrington domitary / commuter towns.

I think as the situation is uncertain, the best situation would be to maintain the status quo. The benefits of dissagregating some of the GM MBCs or alligning Wigan to Merseyside (or reducing the size of Wign MBC) would be outweighed by the costs and confusion of boundary re-organisation.

As LNGCats points out, it is not necessarily the towns which the MBC's within Greater Manchester are named after but the other settlements within these MBC's that need consideration. Take Leigh and Tyldesley for example. I am not massively familiar with the area, but from what I understand it has fairly significant flows of commuters to Manchester City Centre and should definately be part of Greater Manchester. If Wigan 'pulled out' of Greater Manchester (entirely theoretical) then there would be a case for these areas to remain part of Greater Manchester. The same could be said for Prestwich / Cheadle and Gatley which if Bury and Stockport 'pulled out' of Greater Manchester these should arguably be re-distributed to the City itself. Unecessarily complicated and would bring no real benefits.

Overall, the Greater Manchester Authorities are probably the best of the former Metropolitan County Councils at co-operating outside London (and arguably better than London at doing this voluntarily too). This gives them a combined national voice well above the sum of their parts and is likely to have been crucial in securing Metrolink funding, the Commonwealth Games, Media City, the Super Casino, co-operating to have the busiest airport outside the south-east. Would Leigh be getting a guided bus route (whether you are for or against) if Wigan wasn't part of GM?

The importance of GM and its associated LEP is even more important now that the RDAs have been abolished.

So, to summarise, the benfits of Wigan leving Greater Manchester would be very small compared to the benfits of them remaining. This is demonstrated by the recognition of the success of the organisation through the associate membership of Blackpool, Blackburn with Darwen, Cheshire East and Warrington.

Put it this way, we may be estranged to Manchester - but we are a lot closer to it than to Liverpool. If you put Wigan in with St Helens think of the repercussions when it came to the Rugby! :|

I don't see why it would really be an issue for Wigan to be a part of Manchester, I only hope as time goes on and the city expands that we start to play a bigger part in it. Besides, you can just about see the skyline on a clear day, so we're not that far away :D

Wigan. It gets sucked into the gravitational pull of two cities, Liverpool and Manchester. There's pockets of countryside inbetween Manchester and Wigan, and many many from Wigan claim to live in just "Wigan". Yes, vast amounts of people commute from here to Manchester, but vast amounts commute from here to Liverpool too.

Your views?

If you are from Wigan why do you claim to live in Manchester?

I don't think you could really call Preston, Blackburn, Macclesfield and Warrington domitary / commuter towns.

Warrington *definitely* is, as most of its residents travel to work outside the borough/UA, helped by its strategic location and good transportation links.

Glossop is another near example, but technically in a completely different East Midlands region!

If you are from Wigan why do you claim to live in Manchester?

Not speaking for Volde, but most youths clearly associate themselves as Manc, even when they live in Cheshire, such as Knutsford, Handforth, Wilmslow, Macclesfield, etc., because of the social and cultural 'pull' towards Manchester. You see this evidenced with trains full of kids into town at weekends, because there is 'nothing (interesting) to do'.

^^

Very true.

I go to school in Bury so most of my friends live in Bury, Heywood, Rochdale, Ramsbottom etc. Most of them (90% or so) claim to live in Manchester and the ones who don't directly claim to live in "Manchester" say they "don't live in Manchester, they live in Greater Manchester".

Having said that I don't think it's an age thing, whether you acknowledge Manchester's existence or not.

Most large metro areas of large cities class outlying towns and suburbs as part of the mtro area so I don't see why this thread is an issue. Move on, Wigan town is part of Manchester as much as Stockport is.

On the other hand, without it, GM's population would plummet by 0.3 million, and we'd have no chance of beating West Midland's population and claiming fame as "second city" in the near future. If we cancelled Wigan out, we would still have a thin chain of urbanity (Tyldesley, Leigh, Atherton) crawling out until we reach Wigan (even though it's not a solid block of urbanness), which would be rather messy.

It's a difficult one, and I myself can't actually decide. Wigan would suit to be a commuter/dormitory town like Preston, Blackburn, Macclesfield and Warrington, but ideally we want it part of GM so we can carry on claiming GM's population is "nearly 3 million".

Your views?

The sooner people stop obsessing over this childish bullshit the better, is what I think.

It comes up from time to time, usually by Leigh residents with a chip on their shoulder.

It DOES matter, as it concerns the sense of belonging and civic pride.

If you are without those, then a spiral of decline often ensues.

And at least people can say Greater Manchester has 4 Premier League teams!

Should this come to fruition in any form, I think it would demonstrate how strong the ties are between Wigan and Manchester; celebrating its key role in its Industry heritage, canals and Mining.

http://img.photobucket.com/albums/v224/ferge1985/eck1.png?t=1306084991

It comes up from time to time, usually by Leigh residents with a chip on their shoulder.

Is that a reference to me? I ask because there are only two leigh residents on here (I think)
Just amusing if it is because I've only ever discussed this in response to someone else bringing this conversation up, and the only reason I bothered to respond to this thread at all was because of that comment.


Leigh is firmly in the Manchester Urban Area,

In your opinion. In my opinion as a resident, it isn't.

----

In response to Volde's question;
I was going to answer Yes initially because if Wigan wasn't in GM then what are the alternatives?
Lancashire and Merseyside.
It would be strange to be part of the current Lancashire as Wigan would be marooned a distance away from the hub of the county.
With Merseyside, fine I suppose, but it would be no different to being part of GM in terms of integration with the rest of the urban area so what would be the point? In terms of benefiting Wigan I mean. I suppose it would balance out Merseyside & GM more but it would hardly be worth the time, effort and money just for that reason.

However, reading through the thread polarised me to voting No.

Its not integrated into GM and its residents are ignored or treated with indifference/contempt.

I'm assuming here that Volde was talking about the borough as he mentions 0.3million and not the town, despite referencing leigh, atherton & tyldesley seperately.

I do like it but im still not sold on the docks not having canal access.

Wigan part of Merseyside ? I'll have a couple of scoops of what youve been on.
Wiganers love scousers like they love piles, scousers are irratating, serve no usefull purpose and seem to disprove the theory that the neanderthals died out never going to happen.
As for joining our country cousins in Lancs again not going to happen.
Wigan may be on the periphery of the county but so is Rochdale etc.
On a high as Latics are staying up and had a few pints of uncle joe's.
Holts not mint balls.

Of course Wigan should be part of GM.

Greater Manchester's been an enormous success story for nearly 40 years now and I doubt the wiser heads of Wigan would want to leave that. GMCA's headquarters are in Wigan too, so it's difficult to make the case that Wigan gets 'ignored'.

Wigan part of Merseyside ? I'll have a couple of scoops of what youve been on....As for joining our country cousins in Lancs again not going to happen.

Just to clarify... in my post I gave my opinion as to why wigan borough should not be part of either of those.


Greater Manchester's been an enormous success story for nearly 40 years now and I doubt the wiser heads of Wigan would want to leave that

Agree, strong argument.

it's difficult to make the case that Wigan gets 'ignored'.

Disagree if you mean the borough.

Wigan should be allowed to be part of whatever it likes.

We should be using the French model of metropoles where comunes join up with whoever they wish.

Lines should be drawn locally, not in Whitehalll.

Wigan should be allowed to be part of whatever it likes.

We should be using the French model of metropoles where comunes join up with whoever they wish.

Lines should be drawn locally, not in Whitehalll.

The elected councillors did not have to join the LEP or GMCA - they did make their own decision to do so.

Wigan has just as much influence as any other authority on those bodies. Other than it being somewhat more remote than the urban core I don't get this discussion at all. So what if it is distant from the urban core? There are other places similarly not connected to that urban core and the question has not been asked about these places.

A lot of the younger people around Wigan would say yes to this, anyone over 40 seems to hold their lancastrian roots. I noticed on a visit to Wigan that in a lot of the youth and younger store workers they seem to sound a lot less 'Wigan accented' these days, like a Wigany/Mancy hybrid. Have to agree a lot of Wiganers I know wouldn't say associate Wigan with the merseyside area and dislike the scousers (not my views but true from what I know) if you said to someone from Wigan Borough which City so you associate most with Wigan, Manchester, Liverpool or Preston it would be an easy MCR majority.

I have relatives in Atherton and I know that Manchester and Bolton are the places that the town is linked to strongly (the address for Atherton has always been Manchester), along with Tyldesley it borders Salford borough and part of it is under Bolton council and it flows into Worsley within 3 miles from its centre, so they could never imagine themselves being under anything to do with Liverpool should Wigan council ever end up with Liverpool (Wigan councils main function is to basically just empty the bins when they're not running down the towns ammenities). Atherton and Tyldesley are as close to Salford as it is to Wigan and its even closer to Bolton and I know it was a bone on contention when it ended up in Wigan Borough in 1974, something pople don't want to this day.

The Trafford Centre should be the area in danger of falling under Scouse command, whenever i've been there that is the only accent i've heard ;)

^^

I go to school in Bury

Just curious are there no decent schools in Wigan or do you attend a fee paying school?

I'mafreeman, Volde doesn't live in Wigan ;)

I'mafreeman, Volde doesn't live in Wigan ;)

Well you'll have to explain that comment as his post implied that he does and he didn't correct me when I asked my question.

Of course if your comment is some obscure joke I have missed it. :)

No joke, Volde lives but 10mins from me in Salford, or so I believe. Most of Volde's posts on other threads happily let slip his location!

:lol: Iheart's right, I live in Salford. I go to Bury Grammar (although that sounds horribly poncy).

Wigan. It gets sucked into the gravitational pull of two cities, Liverpool and Manchester. There's pockets of countryside inbetween Manchester and Wigan, and many many from Wigan claim to live in just "Wigan". Yes, vast amounts of people commute from here to Manchester, but vast amounts commute from here to Liverpool too.


If you don't live in Wigan why did you use "here" which given your post is about Wigan not Salford implies that's where you live?

So my question should really have been why do you claim to live in Manchester when you really live in Salford? Are you ashamed of it?:bash: My family is from Salford and I'm happy to say so.:)

No decent schools in Salford then?

Have courage, Salford isn't too bad. :)

Whoa hold your horses!

Of course I'm proud to live in Salford, don't jump to the conclusion that I'm not just because I'm not pedantic and go on all the time about "how Salford is a completely different city to Manchester", because it's not. Salford's in Manchester so get over it.

There are, yeah. I could've gone to Bridgewater School just round the corner, but at the time we were choosing which school for me to go the woman who had just stole my dad off my mum was actually working at Bridgewater, so my mum really didn't want me to be around her. That's the only reason, really.

Whoa hold your horses!

Of course I'm proud to live in Salford, don't jump to the conclusion that I'm not just because I'm not pedantic and go on all the time about "how Salford is a completely different city to Manchester", because it's not. Salford's in Manchester so get over it.

There are, yeah. I could've gone to Bridgewater School just round the corner, but at the time we were choosing which school for me to go the woman who had just stole my dad off my mum was actually working at Bridgewater, so my mum really didn't want me to be around her. That's the only reason, really.

That's the spirit, mate. But Salford in Manchester. Oh dear, the natives will be getting restless! :)

To be honest I don't really think there's a huge case of "pedanticness" here in Salford as to whether we're associated with Manchester or not. I think most people here take it as a given, which could be down to a number of factors:

1) Proximity. Manchester and Salford are joined.

2) Amount of commuters. More people commute from Salford into town than any other GM borough.

3) People up and down the country take Salford as "part of Manchester" (which is now being anchored thanks to the BBC move to "Salford Quays, Manchester")

4) Metrolink.

etc.

I don't stand for myself when I say that Salford, where I live, is in Manchester. When I write essays about where I live in French at school, I always say; "J'habite dans Salford, dans le banlieue de Manchester" (I live in Salford, in the suburbs of Manchester".

My parents (who're both 40+), my grandparents (60+), and my friends, 14-16 years of old who're all from Salford all consider themselves Mancunian. I've never heard one of my friends say "Let's hang out at Salford Precinct today instead of in town". In fact, I'm pretty sure many of them don't even know Salford has a precinct.

Anyway, Freeman (or "Libertus" in Latin :|) where do you think Salford lies? :)

Salford's in Manchester so get over it..

I'd be waiting a long time for Manchester City Council to empty me bins ;)

You'll be waiting an even longer time for Salford Council to empty your bins though :lol:

I remember when Blears was tramping around Salford attempting to save her skin after the expenses scandal and the TV interviewed a few people who were uniformly anti.

One of them, a lady in her 50's maybe, having said what she thought of Blears finished with "she doesn't even live in Salford"

Now what were you saying .......

French being taught in Bury. Whatever next. :)

I remember when Blears was tramping around Salford attempting to save her skin after the expenses scandal and the TV interviewed a few people who were uniformly anti.

One of them, a lady in her 50's maybe, having said what she thought of Blears finished with "she doesn't even live in Salford"

Now what were you saying .......

French being taught in Bury. Whatever next. :)

She did indeedy. Made a point of letting us know she lived in lovely Worsley, which is like a different world compared to Salford. I remember it cut back to the MP bloke in the studio who was speaking in her defence who wasn't happy with what the woman and the presenter had said who then spoke with all the grace and charm of someone about to rob you; 'eh, don't be cheeky'


You'll be waiting an even longer time for Salford Council to empty your bins though :lol:
:D

I notice a very definite 'accent boundary' where Wigan butts up to St Helens - they are both in the right Metro area if thats what people want but perhaps some kind of other grouping, maybe Warrington/Wigan/St.Helens would be geographically more appropriate

Forty posts on this subject and not a Scouse troll in sight? Well, all good things have to come to an end.

I've always thought it odd that Wigan should be included in Greater Manchester but I wouldn't worry about it too much. Sometimes I wonder why St Helens is included in Merseyside. It may be closer to the centre of Liverpool than Wigan is to the centre of Manchester but there seems to be the same cultural difference. Wigan and St Helens might better fit under the banner of Lancashire.

It would be nice for us for Wigan to be disconnected from Manchester and connected to Liverpool - we could go after that coveted second city status (joke) but really what should matter is what is in the interests of the people of Wigan.

Most people who live in the towns between Liverpool and Manchester, though they may be partisan to one city, like the fact that they have good access to both of them and that is what needs to be encouraged. The people of Wigan are lucky to have access to two city centres and two airports and that is going to improve with the ongoing rail electrification projects.

In such a densely built up area as the north west, the idea that you can draw meaningful boundaries is rather far-fetched.

Interesting you should touch on that, I think your right and population density comes into it. The furthest south strongly identifies with Manchester but as you head towards the centre it falls and a Wigan identity rises, then once you pass Wigan and carry on north it starts falling again till you get to the border where people feel Lancastrian. However that Lancastrian sense has fallen significantly over the last two decades as people identify themselves more with the 'Metropolitan' cities than 'Rural' Lancashire. The population has definetly urbanised. Whats also observable is that Cumbria which the older generation considered a neighbour in the same way we consider Cheshire a neighbour has become much more alien and distant to the younger generation.