In article , Arthur Figgis
URL:mailto
On Fri, 21 Jan 2005 02:21:17 +1030, (Aidan Stanger)
wrote:

Michael Bell wrote:
Humberside has failed, but it was conceived at a time when the population of
this country was foreseen as 90 million by 2000. Now our problem is falling
population - and London wants to grab as much of it as possible. (Birth rate
dropped to 1.7children/woman in the early 70s,

Yet they still built the Humber bridge!

Election bribe. People still aren't entirely sure they wanted it,
though!

"Humbers*de" failed as a concept not because of birth rates, but
because the overwhelming majority of residents had zero loyalty to or
identification with it. Yorkshiremen and Yellowbellies were happy
where they had been for the previous millennium or so, and didn't feel
the need for any southern politicians to b*gger about with their
identities. :-)

As an administrative area it was a totally artificial lumping together
of two unrelated areas which each had strong loyalties elsewhere. Even
with the bridge there is little communication between the sides of the
estuary. Similarly, there might be a business or political case for
running eastern Kent from Pas de Calais, or for administering the City
of London from Frankfurt, but it's probably not what the people there
want either!

It certainly is true that the Yorkshire/Lincolnshire created difficulties
for Humberside, but if we had to house another 40 million by 2000 (5 years
ago!) those difficulties would have been overcome!


Michael Bell

--

On Sun, 23 Jan 2005 17:32:18 +0000, Michael Bell
wrote:

It certainly is true that the Yorkshire/Lincolnshire created difficulties
for Humberside,

Like, no-one wanted the thing?

but if we had to house another 40 million by 2000 (5 years
ago!) those difficulties would have been overcome!

What difference did it make to housing? The existence of the local
authority doesn't affect the amount of land available. Even after the
demise of the unloved council it was still mostly the same councillors
running things.

I suppose the Powers That Were could have swamped the locals'
hostility to Humberside with indifference, by shipping in vast numbers
of people from well outside the Yorks/Lincs area who would probably be
less bothered about it, but I'm not sure what that would really
achieve!

--
Arthur Figgis Surrey, UK

In article , Arthur Figgis
URL:mailto
On Sun, 23 Jan 2005 17:32:18 +0000, Michael Bell
wrote:

It certainly is true that the Yorkshire/Lincolnshire created difficulties
for Humberside,

Like, no-one wanted the thing?

but if we had to house another 40 million by 2000 (5 years
ago!) those difficulties would have been overcome!

What difference did it make to housing? The existence of the local
authority doesn't affect the amount of land available. Even after the
demise of the unloved council it was still mostly the same councillors
running things.

I suppose the Powers That Were could have swamped the locals'
hostility to Humberside with indifference, by shipping in vast numbers
of people from well outside the Yorks/Lincs area who would probably be
less bothered about it, but I'm not sure what that would really
achieve!

Certainly very few wanted it. But if living space for 40 Million people has
to be created, it would be a huge expansion of existing towns and the
government would have to make decisions where they should live. Humberside
really is a very empty area. But the need never arose!


Michael Bell
--

On Sun, 23 Jan 2005 23:28:58 +0000, Michael Bell
wrote:


Certainly very few wanted it. But if living space for 40 Million people has
to be created, it would be a huge expansion of existing towns and the
government would have to make decisions where they should live. Humberside
really is a very empty area. But the need never arose!

Humberside /was/ ~. It was done away with in the 1990s. The area still
is pretty empty, of course.

I don't see how more people could live in the area when it was known
as Humberside than could live in the same places when they were, and
now they are again, recognised as parts of Yorkshire and Lincolnshire.
If for some reason the government had wanted to put millions of people
into the area it wouldn't have needed to change the local government
to do it, instead it would have needed to get lots of houses built for
those people to live in. Maybe they could have devised a plan to build
a whole new town somewhere, but it wouldn't have made someone in
Bridlington feel closer to Immingham than to Yorkshire, even if the
same council emptied the dustbins at the other side of the Humber
Bridge.

"...can you imagine Len Hutton walking out to bat for Humberside?",
John Major, 1992


--
Arthur Figgis Surrey, UK