Talk:List of towns in England

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[edit] Ubication

Why are cities ordered only by name and no indication whatsoever of there general position is given? (northern, western, eastern, central or southern England)

[edit] miscleanea

Just out of interest why are cities being included in this list, I thought they had their own list G-Man 19:54, 17 Nov 2003 (UTC)

Yes, included in List of cities in the United Kingdom. I suppose including them here is easier than constantly removing them when added by mistake ( 20:00, 17 Nov 2003 (UTC)
I don't think a town necessarily ceases to be such when it's included in a city. UK cities are administrative areas that may contain multiple towns. ( 20:03, 17 Nov 2003 (UTC)
They don't expand the list much, some of the cities are quite surprising (Wells?), and its nice to have them all in one place. I was pondering adding the remaining London Boroughs and so on to the list as well, but perhaps that would be going too far. I could see a case for adding Sutton Coldfield though, perhaps. Morwen 20:05, 17 Nov 2003 (UTC)

What exactly is the entity that receives the status of "town"? Is it typically a borough, or just a vaguely defined urban area? Is St Albans still a town? ( 20:10, 17 Nov 2003 (UTC)

It depends whether the town charters get revoked, I guess. But I think its ok to call things towns that aren't by law towns, just as long as there is sufficient town-ness. Morwen 20:19, 17 Nov 2003 (UTC)
Legally, it needs a Royal charter, which historically was granted so that the place could hold a market or a fair. Therefore is any large inhabited place has a regular market, it's most likely that it's a town (if not a city). If the place no longer holds a market however it may be the case that it still has Royal consent to hold one, as in the case of Brill which hasn't had one for years, yet is still considered a town because it still has royal charter to do so. -- Graham :) 14:19, 9 Feb 2004 (UTC)

When exactly does a village become large enough to be considered a town. For instance Southam and Towcester both have populations of around 5-6,000, and so could be considered large villages rather than towns, I've heard Southam refered to as a village before. Are there any solid rules for this G-Man 10:03, 18 Nov 2003 (UTC)

They both have town councils, so they must surely be towns. But for instance, Cranleigh with a population of over 11,000 is a village, while Moretonhampstead or Winchelsea with around 2,000 people are universally considered towns. So other than looking at common usage, or town councils, mayors, town halls, etc, there are no hard and fast rules. Warofdreams 12:48, 18 Nov 2003 (UTC)
Apparently both Cranleigh and Kidlington claim to be England's biggest village. Shepshed also had that claim, but has since acquired town status. But does anyone have any idea when this happened? -- Stewart 15:37, 13 Jan 2003 (UTC)

Just wondering, should we list towns by their official names or by their common names. For example Leamington Spa which is currently filed under L is officially known as Royal Leamington Spa although hardly anyone calls it by its official title with the 'Royal' bit.

So should it be left as it is under L or should it be called its official title and filed under R ? G-Man 12:40, 2 Mar 2004 (UTC)

Is Brighton and Hove a town?, I dont think so, shouldent Brighton and hove be listed individually? G-Man 15:13, 18 Mar 2004 (UTC)

It is a city. A recent change.
This is an oddity of city status applying to the corporate body, rather than the place itself. Neither Brighton or Hove are cities by themselves, but together they are. In the current list Brighton is listed in bold, but Hove isn't. Perhaps they both should be emboldened with a footnote stating that they only hold this status when considered together. Owain 13:59, 14 Jun 2005 (UTC)

[edit] Expanding the list

Please, before adding more places to this list, check that they are towns. While the list is not currently comprehensive, it is not improved by adding random places which are moderately large and perhaps feel like they should be towns. If they have a town council, evidence of an extant town charter or are very commonly refered to as towns, please include them.

For instance, Barnt Green, recently added is a suburb of Birmingham. Googling for Barnt Green town does not return any articles about Barnt Green as a town. So I've removed it.

Cambourne (in Cambs., not to be confused with Camborne in Cornwall) was added. From the official website: "It’s one large settlement split into three smaller villages — Lower, Great and Upper Cambourne." i.e., it's not a town. It has no town council, no charter, no mayor and no market. So I've removed it. Warofdreams 13:28, 15 Jun 2004 (UTC)

[edit] Cleobury Mortimer

Cleobury Mortimer in Shropshire is a town. I know this for sure and despite its size it is refered to as a town in Shropshire all the time. Talk:Cleobury Mortimer :) David 21:47, 4 April 2006 (UTC)

[edit] Southsea

Southsea is not a town. It is a urban parish within the unitary authority of Portsmouth, see http://www.southseatowncouncil.co.uk/h1.htm. It is misleading to claim town status as the parish council only covers 25% of the area called Southsea. The Town Council name is self granted and meaningless in law Nuttah68 15:07, 21 May 2006 (UTC)

[edit] link to List of civil parishes in England

I've been watching this page for a few months now. While the preamble at the top states that this is the list of towns with charters it doesn't include a link to the list of Civil Parishes or a discussion of the differences. I feel it could be expanded & clarified.MGSpiller 23:20, 21 May 2006 (UTC)

An entity can be both - a town and a parish. All four in my local government district are. - fchd 06:47, 22 May 2006 (UTC)
Looking at the definition of what a town is almost makes this article pointless. Any local government body, at any level, can declare itself a 'town'. Maybe what we need is a article of towns with official recognition (charter, letters patent etc) and the rest move to the appropriate aministrative council level article.
This started with Southsea, which I still maintain is not a town as a)it is wholly within the borders of the City of Portsmouth and b)the 'town' council represents less than a quarter of Southsea Nuttah68 17:09, 22 May 2006 (UTC)
To a large extent this is the list of chartered towns. For simplicities sake I'm going to presume that any local government body larger than a civil parish either is a town or a collection of towns already. Perhaps it would help to move the page to List of chartered towns in England? MGSpiller 19:19, 22 May 2006 (UTC)
I think as the creator of this article I'm somewhat responsible for the confusion here. We really need to decide whether it is a list of chartered towns, a list of places with town councils, or if (as present) the criteria are more complex, we need to specify exactly what they are. If we can find consensus on this, then questions on the position of Southsea and the title of the article should have obvious answers. Thoughts? Warofdreams talk 02:37, 23 May 2006 (UTC)
Half the problem seems to be that, for the UK at least, the term 'town' has no defined meaning and can be applied to anywhere by anyone. Nuttah68 16:36, 23 May 2006 (UTC)

[edit] Liphook

Can I ask why you've removed Liphook from List of towns in England? Nuttah68 08:27, 25 June 2006 (UTC)

I removed Liphook from the list as it is not a town. It has no town council, no market and no sign of ever having had a town charter. Even our article on it states "Liphook is a large village in Hampshire, England." Warofdreams talk 14:58, 25 June 2006 (UTC)
    • In England there is no official entity of a 'Town Council', it is a title that any parish council can adopt. In fact there is no longer any legal or official definition of a 'Town'. To deny Liphook the place on this list merely because one editor has used the word 'village' is arbitrary. Unless you have amore valid reason, will you agree to my restoring it to the list? Nuttah68 20:08, 25 June 2006 (UTC)
No. Can I repeat that Liphook does not meet *any* criterion for being a town. It is not a town. Warofdreams talk 13:44, 26 June 2006 (UTC)
        • I'm sorry, you are still going to provide a better reason for removing Liphook from the list. Either that, or the list gets a major edit as looking through the current article well over 50% of the 'towns' do not meet the criteria as you list them. As a starter Basingstoke, Eastleigh and Milton Keynes do not meet the rules other than they have choosen to call their council a 'town council'. Nuttah68 17:52, 26 June 2006 (UTC)
        • To add further weight, here is the town of Liphook's page from the Hampshire County Council website. http://www.hants.gov.uk/localpages/south_east/liphook/ Nuttah68 18:19, 26 June 2006 (UTC)
As discussed above, a clear definition of what constitutes a town for the purposes of this article would be useful. However, there is no consensus that Liphook is a town. Given that any parish council which feels that the settlement it serves deserved the title "town" can rename themselves, and yet Bramshott and Liphook Parish Council has not done this, this seems a further argument against including Liphook. Warofdreams talk 22:41, 26 June 2006 (UTC)
The adoption and use of the term 'town council' is a matter of political sensitivity. Fareham (pop 108,000) has a borough council, because as well as including the town it encompasses many outlying areas that would not consider themselves part of a town. Havant has a borough council as the council boundaries also includes the town of Waterlooville which has a population of 45,000. Southsea, as discussed earlier, has a town council even though it is in central Portsmouth and has never existed as a seperate entity in its life (it was built as a wealthier suburb of Portsmouth). Here the term has been adopted as Southsea has a different ruling party to the rest of the city.
Liphook council serves areas other than just the town of Liphook, so has not choosen to take the name 'town' for its council. I still maintain that Hampshire CC recognition of Liphook as a town should be enough for inclusion on this list.
The list either has to be only those places that have been awarded the title of 'town' by some higher body and most entries removed, or there has to be an acceptance that the term town is subjective and anything showing use of the word town to describe a place is enough for entry on the list. Nuttah68 15:53, 27 June 2006 (UTC)
Clearly, it wouldn't be possible to have a list which included places with "anything showing use of the word town". You can find places which are actually very small villages described as towns on some websites - either because they use the term for any settlement, or because they are written by people who do not know, or do not care about local usage. What does work at present is including places which are commonly described as towns. Usually, having a town council is good evidence of this, as is having a market, annual fair or other feature associated with having received a town charter. As I say, I clear debate about what to include will be useful, but under no sensible definition can Liphook be included. Warofdreams talk 00:38, 28 June 2006 (UTC)
Liphook is commonly called a town. Hampshire County Council, a higher tier of government, recognises Liphook as a town as I have shown. Liphook has held markets since the 1600s until recently. It has held a fair and carnival annually since the same time. How much more do you want?
I'm afraid your unwillingness to accept recognition from a higher tier of government of Liphook as a town rather strange. Yet you have not questioned many other places that have less to back up their claim. Up to now, it appears that you accept a wikipedia mention of village over a official mention of town. Nuttah68 16:29, 28 June 2006 (UTC)
OK, that's promising. I can't find anything online, but if you have sources for it having had a market and a fair, they can go in the Liphook article, and we then have some evidence for Liphook being a town. Whether or not one page on Hampshire County Council's website calls Liphook a town is irrelevant; it's unsourced, and plenty of other pages on their site refer to it as a village. If you have some specific places in mind on this list which don't fit the criteria, then by all means let's look at them, but Basingstoke, Milton Keynes and Eastleigh fall into the "generally referred to as a town" category, so should be included under current guidelines. Warofdreams talk 23:55, 28 June 2006 (UTC)
TBH, no I can no longer be bothered with this debate. The criteria are subjective and list has become meaningless and POV. A quick skim of the list shows housing estates and suburbs scattered throughout, let alone hamlet/village/town questionables. I am the only person researching the topic. If you want my sources, type Liphook into Google, it's all there in the first 30 returns. Nuttah68 16:24, 29 June 2006 (UTC)

[edit] West & South Yorkshire

There are a lot of places in this area that refer to themselves as towns yet are not on the list. Whether they are official towns or not, I don't know. Someone might want to check though:

  • Heckmondwike
  • Horbury
  • Liversedge
  • Mirfield
  • South Kirkby & Moorthorpe
  • South Elmsall

Note that the last three all call their council a "town council". Heckmondwike has a market. Epa101 12:55, 31 August 2006 (UTC)

"Official" is a difficult term here, but Heckmondwike, Mirfield and South Elmsall certainly seem to count. Horbury and Liversedge don't seem to meet any of the criteria. South Kirkby and Moorthorpe is (in my view) best omitted, as it is not a simple example of a town, but rather a multi-centred parish which has (declared itself?) a town. Warofdreams talk 16:32, 31 August 2006 (UTC)

South Kirkby & Moorthorpe has indeed declared itslef to be a town. This is not without precedent. Ossett, where I live, was originally founded as "Ossett-cum-Gawthorpe", and then just shortened to "Ossett". Horbury has a town hall, and all of the locals refer to it as a town. Don't know much about Liversedge, although it is a "postal town" - letters are just Liversedge, West Yorkshire. Epa101 16:30, 1 September 2006 (UTC)

P.S. Grimethorpe calls its centre a "town centre" on all signposts and in council documents. They may also be worth consideration. Epa101 16:37, 1 September 2006 (UTC)

The town hall in Horbury is an argument for its inclusion, although Google turns up a lot of sites referring to it as a village and rather fewer talking about it as a town. This tendency is even more pronounced in the case of Grimethorpe. The postal town isn't very relevant here; many villages and suburbs have postal addresses typically in this format. Warofdreams talk 02:11, 4 September 2006 (UTC)

I've added Heckmondwike and South Elmsall to the list, for I cannot see how anyone can dispute how they are towns. Shall wait a bit longer in case of further comments on the rest. Epa101 10:07, 17 September 2006 (UTC)


Now added more: Mirfield, South Kirkby & Moorthorpe, Brierley all on there; they fit the legal definition. However, now I note some places that are on there that maybe shouldn't be. What about Featherstone, Knottingley and Stainforth? What basis is there for calling them towns? None of them call their councils "town councils". Featherstone has a market, but the other two don't. Epa101 17:36, 10 October 2006 (UTC)

Actually, Featherstone does have a town council. I just saw that it listed a parish clerk [rather than a town clerk] on a Wakefield district website. Epa101 09:15, 14 October 2006 (UTC)
OK, thanks for the additions. Stainforth also has a town council (see [1]). Knottingley has a town hall, but it's pretty marginal. Warofdreams talk 18:44, 14 October 2006 (UTC)

[edit] Toxteth?

What basis is there for calling Toxteth a town? On http://www.visionofbritain.org.uk , it doesn't even seem to have been a separate place from Liverpool at any point.

I believe that it is because it has a town hall. However, toxteth.net states "Even though the locals call 'Toxteth Town Hall' by this name, it is not and never has been a Town Hall", so I've removed it. Warofdreams talk 16:11, 22 September 2006 (UTC)
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