What do you think of when you hear the word Birmingham?

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Ag said:
Are any other major cities around just ignored in favour of better ones?
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San Jose is bigger than San Francisco, and they are pretty close together geographically.
 
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OT: Cities in America are weird. On GoogleMaps if you look up a city it appears with very strict red borders as to what constitutes the city and what doesn't and there are pockets everywhere of "bits" that supposedly aren't part of the city. Fairly certain it's only America that does this.
 
Tisch said:
OT: Cities in America are weird. On GoogleMaps if you look up a city it appears with very strict red borders as to what constitutes the city and what doesn't and there are pockets everywhere of "bits" that supposedly aren't part of the city. Fairly certain it's only America that does this.
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Not to shock you, but it often has to do with racism. Cities sometimes annex each other and do weird things
 
You notice how much more DESIGNED American cities are compared the UK. American suburbs in particular are literally just grid patterns full of houses. You’d never see that here.
 
Tisch said:
OT: Cities in America are weird. On GoogleMaps if you look up a city it appears with very strict red borders as to what constitutes the city and what doesn't and there are pockets everywhere of "bits" that supposedly aren't part of the city. Fairly certain it's only America that does this.
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You kind of get it with Manchester though? Remember the uproar when the middle class suburbs were put into a high tier when they firmly believed they were Cheshire not Manchester.
 
Soldi said:
American suburbs in particular are literally just grid patterns full of houses
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This pretty much only applies to a few cities in the northeast (Boston, New York etc.) and a few more trendy recent builds. Roads designed in the 20th century are horrible
 
Soldi said:
You notice how much more DESIGNED American cities are compared the UK. American suburbs in particular are literally just grid patterns full of houses. You’d never see that here.
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Milton Keynes and some of the other new towns have that vibe, although fewer straight lines and more roundabouts.
 
RJN said:
Not to shock you, but it often has to do with racism. Cities sometimes annex each other and do weird things
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Lucille said:
You kind of get it with Manchester though? Remember the uproar when the middle class suburbs were put into a high tier when they firmly believed they were Cheshire not Manchester.
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It's a similar story to why the borders of Greater London are as they are. When they drafted it up in the 60s every town's council had to be consulted about where they now fell and someone were for it, and others snobbishly didn't want to part of London. It's there's a little NUBBY it in the South-West which is basically Chessington World of Adventures. :D
 
Tisch said:
It's a similar story to why the borders of Greater London are as they are. When they drafted it up in the 60s every town's council had to be consulted about where they now fell and someone were for it, and others snobbishly didn't want to part of London. It's there's a little NUBBY it in the South-West which is basically Chessington World of Adventures. :D
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Christ I could watch hours of YouTube clips on the design of London.

I almost did a Masters on the sociology of cityplanning at Goldsmiths. But it was a shithole.
 
Ag said:
Christ I could watch hours of YouTube clips on the design of London.

I almost did a Masters on the sociology of cityplanning at Goldsmiths. But it was a shithole.
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Noted Goldsmiths alumni Lucy found SHAKING.

But yes it was falling apart at the seams when I was there.
 
Lucille said:
Noted Goldsmiths alumni Lucy found SHAKING.

But yes it was falling apart at the seams when I was there.
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I got accepted and THEN went for an open day. With the least possible respect, as a humanities queen, it really was 95% art students who I have opinions of. There was also a protest sabotaging the open day. Also it was a bit ramshackle.

As fun as it could have been going to a Uni in London, while studying London it would also have been terrible.
 
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Having a friend who lives in London is always handy. One of my friends was a Goldsmiths student and she lived in Lee. I only stayed with her the once.
 
New Cross is also one of those zone 2 areas like Bethnal Green that just refuses to gentrify and will always be a BIT SHIT.
 
Tisch said:
OT: Cities in America are weird. On GoogleMaps if you look up a city it appears with very strict red borders as to what constitutes the city and what doesn't and there are pockets everywhere of "bits" that supposedly aren't part of the city. Fairly certain it's only America that does this.
Click to expand...

it’s a modern phenomenon really as urban centres get bigger. Now there’s two distinct categorisations of a city - the city itself and the wider city region. In this country often referred to as the metropolitan borough.

Greater Manchester is the perfect example. A lot of people say they live in Manchester when they actually don’t. Bolton, Stockport, Oldham, there’s loads of cities around the city that benefit from being part of the wider metropolis.

every major US city is like this too.

It plays havoc with population counts though. In some lists, Liverpool is bigger than Manchester for population. It depends where you draw the boundaries. Liverpool city region actually takes in The Wirral, Sefton, Knowsley, St Helens and Halton and is actually fucking massive (and growing - it keeps swallowing small towns on the perimeter. Where I live once fell under West Lancashire. Not any more)
 
funky said:
it’s a modern phenomenon really as urban centres get bigger. Now there’s two distinct categorisations of a city - the city itself and the wider city region. In this country often referred to as the metropolitan borough.

Greater Manchester is the perfect example. A lot of people say they live in Manchester when they actually don’t. Bolton, Stockport, Oldham, there’s loads of cities around the city that benefit from being part of the wider metropolis.

every major US city is like this too.

It plays havoc with population counts though. In some lists, Liverpool is bigger than Manchester for population. It depends where you draw the boundaries. Liverpool city region actually takes in The Wirral, Sefton, Knowsley, St Helens and Halton and is actually fucking massive (and growing - it keeps swallowing small towns on the perimeter. Where I live once fell under West Lancashire. Not any more)
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Are you one of my lecturers?
 
Tisch said:
*tisch has his 32nd breakdown about why he chose languages as his degree and not something humanities related*
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Never fear! I ended up with English as my major. You're in GOOD COMPANY.


*applies for dole*
 
funky said:
:D

Urbanisation was the only part of my sociology course I took any interest in. It was actually quite interesting.
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Should’ve done my course bebs, it’s the whole thing!
 
This Peaky Blinders looking Birmingham is very appealing, but I'm not actually sure how much of Birmingham actually still looks like this. Liverpool and Manchester have a lot more industrial revolution era buildings and seem to have put them to better use.

Hand-Luggage-Only-2.jpg
 
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