2012 City Status competition

[garbon]

Dear god man, what's coming over you ? 

You do realise that it's the only UK constituency represented by a Green Party MP ?   

Surely that'll be enough to revolt the old Garbon ?

It is our San Fran and he loved living there.

This.

[fhdz]

The hell is that bizarre traffic paint in front of the bus in Wolverhampton? Does it connote the spot in the road where buses need to squeeze like accordions for a few meters?

[garbon]

The hell is that bizarre traffic paint in front of the bus in Wolverhampton? Does it connote the spot in the road where buses need to squeeze like accordions for a few meters?

I can't see that photo. Is it one of those Zebra crossings?

[Duque de Bragança]

Dover is so famous the French even have a word for it.

Yep, Douvres.

Might lose it the future though look what happened to

- Bouquinquan :
- Ouestmoutiers :
- Vicêtre (Bicêtre) :

I'll let you guess the English forms

[Martinus]

I like how the picture for Telford is some 19th century guy. 

They all look like shitholes. I am voting for Brighton as it could be the world's capital of kitsch.

[Richard Hakluyt]

Given the selection of photos I would advise you not to apply for a job at the British Tourism Authority 

[The Brain]

Lisburn is in Portugal.

[Eddie Teach]

Given the selection of photos I would advise you not to apply for a job at the British Tourism Authority 

I dunno, might be interesting to take a trip to Reading and see the world Austin Powers lived in.

[Josquius]

Given the selection of photos I would advise you not to apply for a job at the British Tourism Authority 

That was the point with most

[The Larch]

But these are all very provincial cities.  I wouldn't expect anyone outside the UK to know of almost any of them.  I didn't even know of Telford and I wish I didn't know about Dover

Just with the football teams is enough to put several of them in the map. I mean, Blackburn Rovers even won the Premiership once!

And I might work with an organization that is located in Stirling. 

[Gups]

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Eijc2tGe-zM

Vote Newport (and piss ogf Jay-Z and Alicia)

Concrete jumble, nothing in order
Not far from the border....
When you're in Newport
Chips, cheese, curry makes you feel brand new
Washed down with a Special Brew

[Barrister]

Given the selection of photos I would advise you not to apply for a job at the British Tourism Authority 

I dunno, might be interesting to take a trip to Reading and see the world Austin Powers lived in.

CBC Radio has a show "As It Happens" which has been on the air for fourty-plus years.  It's a reasonably straight-forward news and current events show on the air from 6:30 to 8.

But they have a delightfully-quirky tradition of listing every possible location in England in terms of it's distance from Reading.  E.g.  "London, located 43 miles to the East of Reading..."

So it'd be amusing to go to Reading just to visit "Ground Zero", so to speak.   

[Gups]

Don't go to Reading BB. Here's what the Idler had to say about it and they're not exagerrating

Your notable idle predecessor – Jerome K Jerome – highlighted Reading's failings, in 'Three Men In A Boat', as a carbuncle on the Thames. However, even he had difficulty coming up with a suitable adjective to describe the grey/brown miasma that shrouds the town, suffocating its inhabitants.

Reading is of course famous as the unwelcome home of Oscar Wilde. No worse prison could have been invented for the man. In 'The Ballard Of Reading Gaol' he speaks for everyone who has spent time there:

"In Reading gaol by Reading town
There is a pit of shame"

Until recently, the only entertainment for a young boy or girl growing up in Reading was a set of benches outside Boots the Chemist. The place had a smattering of pubs, all populated by either violent rockers or even more violent men in yellow pullovers, white socks and toggled slip-on shoes ("The Casuals") or, the leitmotif of all provincial towns, the teenage gothic. The nearest functioning cinema was in Bracknell, the only clothes shop was a C&A, and the one "restaurant" a Wimpy.

Reading was but 30 minutes from London, yet it felt like a lifetime away. London has Soho and Mayfair; Reading defined itself with Smelly Alley – a fish market in the center of town – and the Butt's Center – a 1970′s shopping concrete complex designed to attract glue-sniffers from throughout the world.

A statute of Queen Victoria has her back to the town, so much did she hate it. The other statute in the town is of a lion, but the sculptor designed the legs backwards then killed himself.

The people were oily thuggish and believed in queues above all else. Staring was considered a crime.

One story is of a teenager who stole a bag from the station, ran home with it, looked inside, discovered it contained a bomb and threw it into his own (Well, his Mother's anyway), garden and split before it blew. Only someone from Reading could steal a bomb and blow up their Mother's garden.

Nevertheless, it was a paradise in those days compared to what it is now. Benefiting from millions of pounds of renovation and a massive economic boom, Reading looks more like Bilbao. But insurance salesmen, estate agents, foreign exchange students and mobile telephone engineers populate it. Scum in other words. It is a shrine to par venue pretensions. It may be shinny and new, but the whiff of boredom, wretchedness and despair reaches the nostrils and reminds one of the acrid rotten foundations.

Kate Winslet, Tanita Tikaram, Kenneth Brannagh all came from Reading. Do they talk about it? I haven't heard them.

Ralph El Turk

HEY

Hey!!!

Reading rocks!

Kathy Dawson

IT SMELLS OF WEE

The whole place smells of stale urine. In fact, rogue widdling
is eating away at shop doorways and has become such a problem that the council has installed several pop-up urinals at �20,000 a go to try and encourage the Reading male to wee in appropriate places.

It has no soul and no defining characteristics at all. The art deco cinema in the decrepit centre of town is due to be pulled down because the developer claimed it 'had no architectural value' whereas of course the overpriced flats he's going to build will have.

I'm taking advantage of the ridiculous house prices and moving very shortly.

[Ed Anger]

I'm going to slightly hijack this thread about BBC America. HOW THE FUCK IS STAR TREK THE NEXT GENERATION AND BATTLESTAR GALACTICA BRITISH PROGRAMMING?

Thank you.

[Eddie Teach]

Patrick Stewart, obviously.