Swansea

from Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
City and County of Swansea
England Anglesey Flintshire Wrexham Denbighshire Conwy Gwynedd Ceredigion Pembrokeshire Carmarthenshire Swansea Neath Port Talbot Bridgend Rhondda Cynon Taf Merthyr Tydfil Blaenau Gwent Caerphilly Vale of Glamorgan Cardiff Newport Torfaen Monmouthshire PowysSwansea
About this picture
Administrative headquarters Swansea
surface 378 km²
Residents 241,300 (2014)
Welsh speakers 22.5%
ISO 3166-2 GB-SWA
ONS code 00NX
Website www.swansea.gov.uk
Swansea

Swansea [ ˈswɒnzɪ ] ( Welsh Abertawe [ abɛrˈtauɛ ]) is a city in South Wales and at the same time a Principal Area . Swansea lies on the coast of the Bristol Channel immediately east of the Gower Peninsula . It is the second largest city in Wales after the capital Cardiff and one of the 40 largest cities in the United Kingdom of Great Britain and Northern Ireland . The actual core city has 169,000 inhabitants. Swansea has a population of around 241,300 as a county and has both county and city status .

Origin of name

The English name Swansea is derived from the Old Norse "Sveinns ey", meaning Svens Eiland, and can be traced back to the time of the Viking raids along the Welsh south coast. For this reason, the name is also pronounced as Swan's-y ([ˡswɒnzi]) and not as Swan-sea. The Welsh name is derived from the mouth ( aber ) of the River Tawe .

history

After the Normans had conquered the Gower Peninsula for Henry I at the beginning of the 12th century , Henry de Beaumont built Swansea Castle over the mouth of the Tawe to secure his rule . A settlement was created around the castle due to the arrival of English settlers, in which a weekly market was held to supply the castle. A small port was built at the mouth of the river. Swansea received its first royal charter between 1158 and 1184, and Johann Ohneland gave the city another charter in 1215. The city was probably already fortified with earth walls, palisades and moats, which were replaced by stone walls in the 14th century. Nevertheless, the city was conquered and destroyed several times by insurgent Welsh, the last time in 1402 during the rebellion of Owain Glyndŵr .

The city was administered by Portreeve , which had been supported by 12 councilors since the 14th century. In Swansea, wool was processed through water-powered wool mills, as well as leather. Leather, wool, butter, cheese and grain were exported to England. In addition to the weekly market, two, from the 16th century three, annual markets were held. In the middle of the 16th century the city had only about 1000 inhabitants, in the middle of the 17th century there were 2000 inhabitants. The port became more important due to the coal mining in South Wales, from the 17th century Swansea exported iron as well as coal. In addition, shipbuilding and wool weaving continued to have great economic importance. In the 18th century Swansea expanded into an industrial city with a porcelain factory, copper smelter, and tin and zinc production.

In the 19th century, the city was a center of the metal industry and was considered the main port of entry for copper ore from Chile . The port was therefore the home port of many Cape Horn sailors such as the County of Peebles , and the port experienced a huge boom in the 19th century through industrialization. The tinplate industry was booming in the second half of the 19th century . The construction of the Swansea Canal to Abercrave made the coalfields of South Wales accessible by ship. As a connection to the port, one of the first railways in the world was built in Swansea, the Swansea and Mumbles Railway , which was also the first railway to carry passengers. In 1801 the city still had 6,831 inhabitants, in 1901 there were already 134,000. Like many of the rapidly growing cities of the time, Swansea was overcrowded, filthy, and unsanitary. Cholera epidemics broke out in the city in 1832 and 1849 . In 1835 the local administration was reformed and the town was given the status of a borough with a mayor. In the same year the Swansea Museum was founded, and in 1911 the Gynn Vivian Art Gallery .

From the 1920s the oil port and refinery were built. After the shipbuilding industry and tinplate, steel and copper processing flourished until the 1920s, the city was hit hard by the Great Depression from 1929 . The economic crisis resulted in high unemployment. The Second World War brought a renewed boom in the metal and shipbuilding industry, but from 1940 the city was also the target of a total of 44 German air raids, in which a total of 387 people died. From February 19 to 21, 1941, the city was the target of a three-day air raid known as The Three Nights Blitz , which completely destroyed the city center, but hardly damaged the port and industrial facilities.

After the end of the Second World War, heavy industry fell into a structural crisis . The city center, which was destroyed by the air raids, was rebuilt in a modern way in the 1960s. 1969 Swansea got the status of a City . The Maritime and Industrial Museum opened in an old warehouse in 1977 and reopened as the Waterfront Museum in 2005 . In 1996, as the City and County of Swansea, Swansea became one of 22 Principal Areas in Wales.

economy

The metal industry and shipbuilding have lost much of their former importance. The port is still important, since 1969 there has been a ferry connection to Cork in Ireland. The South Dock , closed in 1969 , has been used as a marina since 1982 . The city administration sought to diversify the economy by designating new business parks such as Fforestfach in the late 1940s and Cwndu in the 1960s. The Technicum Swansea Innovation Center in the former port area is considered a high-tech innovation center .

Since 2010 there have been plans to build a tidal power plant in Swansea Bay . The plant would likely be the largest tidal power plant in the world. The project was approved by the Ministry of Energy in 2015. Construction is expected to begin in autumn 2016 at the earliest [out of date] and completion in 2019 at the earliest.

"Ugly, lovely town"

In contrast to Cardiff, Swansea was not exposed to a comparable increase in immigration from England or Ireland ; The proportion of the Welsh-speaking population is therefore still higher today. The famous saying by Dylan Thomas that Swansea is an ugly, lovely town has become just as much a winged word and unofficial motto of Swansea as Dirty Old Town became for Salford .

Partnerships

Swansea's twin cities are Mannheim in Germany (since 1959), Pau in France and Cork in Ireland .

traffic

The M4 motorway runs through Swansea. Bus transport in and around Swansea is operated by First Cymru and Veolia Transport Cymru .

Swansea train station can be reached from Cardiff Central (with connections to Bristol, Birmingham, Nottingham and Manchester) or London Paddington.

The Cardiff Airport is 65 km away.

education

The University of Swansea with around 11,000 students has a campus in Singleton Park . It is the third largest university in Wales. Her engineering department became known as a center for pioneering computer techniques for solving structural design problems. Other educational institutions in the city include Swansea Metropolitan University and Swansea College with Gorseinon College on the outskirts. Swansea College and Gorseinon College have formed the joint Gower College since 2010.

Swansea has many comprehensive schools managed by the local school board, including two Welsh middle schools. The oldest school in Swansea is the Bishop Gore School, founded in 1682 as a Grammar School . The largest comprehensive school in Swansea is the Olchfa School . Swansea is home to The Bible College of Wales . The best known independent school in Swansea is Ffynone House .

Swansea City, 2011 Promotion Celebration
Swansea marina

Sports

The local professional football club is called Swansea City and played in the years 1981-1983 in the highest English league. As a Welsh Cup winner, Swansea City has participated in the European Cup Winners' Cup several times . The club has played in the modern Liberty Stadium since 2005 . In 2011 he was promoted to the Premier League , which the club belonged to until relegation in 2018.

Recreation and tourism

Swansea has become a tourist destination because of its coastal location and landscape. There are long sandy beaches on the coasts at Langland, Caswell and Limeslide. Swansea Bay, which forms the beginning of the Gower Peninsula , is popular with water sports enthusiasts. The bays of the Gower Peninsula and Swansea Bay are largely accessible to hikers by coastal paths. The former fishing village of Mumbles is well known . Before closing in 2003, the Swansea Leisure Center , built in 1977, was one of the top ten most visited visitor attractions in Great Britain.

sons and daughters of the town

Catherine Zeta-Jones (2005)

Honorary citizen

Jimmy Carter

Web links

Commons : Swansea  - collection of pictures, videos and audio files

Individual evidence

  1. ↑ [1] ( MS Excel ; 291 kB)
  2. ^ A Brief History of Swansea, West Glamorgan, Wales. Retrieved June 27, 2013 .
  3. ↑ City and County of Swansea: Swansea in the Blitz. (No longer available online.) Archived from the original on May 11, 2013 ; Retrieved June 26, 2013 . Info: The archive link was inserted automatically and has not yet been checked. Please check the original and archive link according to the instructions and then remove this notice. @1@ 2Template: Webachiv / IABot / www.swansea.gov.uk
  4. ↑ UKSPA: Technium, Swansea. (No longer available online.) Archived from the original on July 19, 2013 ; Retrieved June 26, 2013 . Info: The archive link was inserted automatically and has not yet been checked. Please check the original and archive link according to the instructions and then remove this notice. @1@ 2Template: Webachiv / IABot / www.ukspa.org.uk
  5. ↑ Swansea ( Memento of the original from December 21, 2010 in the Internet Archive ) Info: The archive link was inserted automatically and has not yet been checked. Please check the original and archive link according to the instructions and then remove this notice. @1@ 2Template: Webachiv / IABot / www.swansea.gov.uk

Coordinates: 51 ° 37 ′  N , 3 ° 56 ′  W