(Redirected from North-East England)
'North-East England' is one of the nine official
regions of England and comprises the combined area of
Northumberland,
County Durham,
Tyne and Wear and a small part of
North Yorkshire. The North East has the
lowest GDP/capita in
England.
The highest point in the region is
The Cheviot, in Northumberland, at . The principal city is
Newcastle, with the largest city in terms of area and population being
Sunderland.
As well as its urban centres of
Tyneside,
Wearside and
Teesside the region is also noted for the richness of its natural beauty.
Northumberland National Park, the region's coastline, its section of the
Pennines and
Weardale provides evidence for this. It also has great historic importance, the evidence of which is seen in Northumberland's Castles and the two
World Heritage Sites of
Durham Cathedral and
Hadrian's Wall.
The shipbuilding industry that once dominated both Wearside and Tyneside suffered a terrible decline during the second half of the
twentieth century. Tyneside is now re-inventing itself as an international centre of art and culture and, through The Centre For Life, scientific research (especially in
stem cell technology). After suffering economic decline during the last century,
Wearside is becoming an important area for
quaternary industry, science and
high technology. The economy of
Teesside is largely based on its
petrochemical industry. Northumberland and County Durham, both being largely
rural, base much of its economy on
farming and
tourism.
In May 2005 the 'Passionate people. Passionate places' Regional Image campaign was launched to promote North East England as a great place to work, study, visit and invest in.
Local government
The official
region consists of the following subdivisions:
Key:
shire county = † |
metropolitan county =
★
History
The region was created in 1994 and was originally defined as
Northumberland,
Tyne and Wear,
County Durham and
Cleveland. As part of a reform of local government Cleveland has since been abolished and several unitary districts created. The North East has been considered to be very religious especially County Durham, some of the scenery in the outlying villages is amongst the best in the land.
The region is now considered to consist of four distinct 'sub-regions':
★ County Durham
★ Northumberland
★ Tyne and Wear
★
Tees Valley (former Cleveland area plus Darlington)
Friendly City
The region has been counted as the most friendly in the UK, Newcastle attracts thousands of visitors per month such as Stag and Hen partys.
Biodiversity
The region has a rich natural heritage, its diverse landscape includes maritime cliffs and extensive moorland containing a number of rare species of
flora and
fauna. Of particular importance are the saltmarshes of
Lindisfarne,the Tees Estuary, the heaths, bogs and traditional upland hay meadows of the North Pennines, the distinctive Arctic-alpine flora of Upper Teesdale, the
Farne Islands (which contain rare seabirds such as the
Roseate Tern) and the Magnesian Limestone grasslands of East Durham - a habitat found nowhere else in the world. The North East also features woodland such as
Kielder Forest, the largest man-made forest in
Europe. This is located within
Northumberland National Park and contains an important habitat for the
endangered red squirrel. The region is the English stronghold of black grouse and contains 80-90% of the UK population of
yellow marsh saxifrage.
Transport
Most important towns in the North East are on the
East Coast Main Line, with fast connections to London and Edinburgh, as well as being close to the
A1 or
A19. However, north of
Morpeth, the A1 is single carriageway. There is the
Newcastle International Ferry Terminal at
North Shields.
DFDS operate two ferries a day to
Amsterdam and one a day on the
Stavanger -
Haugesund -
Bergen route. The two main airports are
Newcastle Airport and
Durham Tees Valley Airport.
The
Tyne and Wear Metro is a light rail network which serves the metropolitan county of Tyne and Wear, with stations in both Sunderland and Newcastle city centres, other towns and suburbs in the county, as well as at Newcastle Airport and other attractions such as
The Stadium of Light,
St. James' Park and
Gateshead Inernational Staidum
Economy
The North-East region has the
lowest GDP/capita in
England, and second lowest in the
United Kingdom only behind
Wales. The economy for several decades was idiosyncratically predicated on
ship building and
coal mining; hence the phrase ''taking ''. County Durham and Northumberland are largely agricultural. Nationally well-known companies in the North East include
ICI in Middlesbrough.
Swan Hunter still makes ships in
Wallsend.
Scottish & Newcastle is the largest UK-owned brewery, and has the Newcastle Federation Brewery in
Dunston, producing
Newcastle Brown Ale.
Petroplus refine oil at the
Port Clarence (former Teesside) Refinery. The government's
Child benefit office is in
Washington.
Northern Rock building society is based in
Gosforth.
Findus UK is based in
Longbenton.
Nestlé have a chocolate factory in
Fawdon. The
MetroCentre, the largest shopping centre in Europe, is in
Dunston. Before 2000 the Government Offices in Longbenton had a 1 mile long corridor which went all along the outside of the buildings, since then the whole place has changed with new buildings being built.
Education
The North East education system consists of largely
comprehensive schools but with a number of private and independent schools found in Newcastle, Sunderland, Durham, Stockton and Northumberland in particular. At
GCSE level, the region performs similar to other largely urban areas although generally results are below the national average. Middlesbrough performs the worst with average results significantly below the national average for England, followed closely by Newcastle and Sunderland. Both Northumberland and North Tyneside perform above average, with Northumberland the best. St Thomas More R.C. School in
Blaydon (a voluntary funded Roman Catholic specialist technology college) and Emmanuel College (a selective independent state school) are two of the best performing schools in Gateshead. Other well performing schools in the region include Gateshead High School for Girls,
Westfield School in Newcastle,
Park View Community School in Durham and
Lord Lawson of Beamish Community School in Birtley.
At A-level, local education authorities in the north east are improving at a greater rate than the national average, but produce results substantially below other areas of the England. Sunderland performs the best, followed by Darlington and Redcar and Cleveland. South Tyneside is the worst performing
LEAs at A-level in the region.
The independent and private schools in the area perform highly.
Central Newcastle High School and
Royal Grammar School, Newcastle were both named in the top 100 independent schools nationally in 2006. Other well-performing private schools include
Durham School, one of the oldest schools in England and Grindon Hall Christian School in Sunderland, a private non-selective school. The private schools out-perform the state schools.
Top ten state schools in North East England (A level results 2006)
★ 1.
Cleveland College of Art and Design (910)
★ 2.
Queen Elizabeth Sixth Form College
★ 3.
Durham Johnston Comprehensive School
★ 4.
Queen Elizabeth High School, Hexham
★ 5.
Park View Community School
★ 6.
St Robert of Newminster Roman Catholic School
★ 7.
King Edward VI School, Morpeth
★ 8.
Cramlington Community High School
★ 9.
Bede College
★ 10.
Longbenton Community College (803)
At the
higher education level the North East contains a number of internationally acclaimed
universities. These include the
University of Durham, the third oldest university in England;
Newcastle University, a member of the
Russel Group and the newer universities of
Northumbria University,
Sunderland University and the
University of Teesside.
Local media
Local media include:
★ Regional television comes the
BBC North East and Cumbria region, which has the regional evening
Look North programme from
Spital Tongues in Newcastle. The ITV region,
Tyne Tees Television, has the evening programme
North East Tonight from Gateshead.
★ BBC Radios
Newcastle and
Cleveland(BBC Tees)
★ Commercial radio stations such as:
Metro Radio (Newcastle),
100-102 Century FM (Gateshead),
Galaxy North East (
Wallsend),
96.6 TFM (
Thornaby-on-Tees),
Alpha 103.2 (Darlington),
Sun FM (Sunderland), and
Durham FM.
★ Community radio stations also operate in the area such as:
NE1 FM(Newcastle).
★ Local regional newspapers are the
Sunderland Echo (
Sunderland),
Evening Chronicle (Newcastle),
The Journal (Newcastle),
Evening Gazette (Teesside) (Middlesbrough),
Shields Gazette (
South Shields),
Hartlepool Mail, and
The Northern Echo (Darlington).
See also
★
Bands and musicians from the North East
★
List of schools in the North East of England
External links
★
North East Regional Assembly
★
One NorthEast - Regional Development Agency
★
North East England
★
The Official Visitor Site for Northumberland
★
The Myers Project
★
The North East Biodiversity Forum
★
The North East Group of the Botanical Society of the British Isles
العربية
中国
Français
Deutsch
Ελληνική
हिन्दी
Italiano
日本語
Português
Русский
Español
