diamond geezer

 Wednesday, January 13, 2021

After almost a year of not going very far, and with an eye on one day being able to travel again, I wondered where's the largest town I haven't been to?

To be explicit, that's the largest English town or city by population that I've never set foot in. Travelling through (or standing on a station platform) doesn't count.

My first task was to find a definitive ranking of English towns and cities by population. I thought this was going to be difficult but no, the Office for National Statistics has a portal called Nomis which offers free access to up-to-date data. I selected a) major towns and cities, b) all ages c) all genders, and within seconds I was downloading the spreadsheet I needed. The list that follows is based on built-up areas, not necessarily administrative boundaries or wider city regions.

England's largest towns and cities by population

1London8,920,000
2Birmingham1,160,000
3Liverpool587,000
4Bristol577,000
5Manchester563,000
6Sheffield552,000
7Leeds511,000
8Leicester416,000
9Coventry382,000
10Bradford356,000

No problem so far, I've been to all ten. I've also blogged about all of them, which is why each city links to an old post. One I live in and five I've been to numerous times, as befits the country's great cultural centres. But Sheffield's had just three visits, Leicester and Bristol two apiece and Bradford only one. You may already have spotted a city you haven't been to, in which case you can stop there, you have a winner. I need to carry on.

11Nottingham316,000
12Kingston upon Hull288,000
13Newcastle upon Tyne288,000
14Stoke-on-Trent278,000
15Southampton270,000
16Plymouth266,000
17Derby265,000
18Reading258,000
19Wolverhampton246,000
20Brighton and Hove245,000

I've been to all these too, mostly several times. Stoke on Trent was a one-off day trip but once is enough to tick a city off. Nottingham's linked post consists of a single photograph, so I really ought to go back and try harder, but again it totally counts. The first dodgy city on my list is Southampton which I have only slightly visited. I changed trains there once and deliberately wandered out of a side exit onto the pavement for a few seconds so I could say I'd been, because in my rules visiting the station doesn't count. Southampton really should be top of my list for a post-lockdown safari... but I have technically been, so let's move on.

21Northampton230,000
22Portsmouth230,000
23Luton222,000
24Bournemouth197,000
25Norwich197,000
26Swindon192,000
27Southend-on-Sea185,000
28Milton Keynes185,000
29Bolton180,000
30Peterborough179,000

These are all multi-visits, for me at least, apart from Swindon and Bolton which are single trips. They've also all been blogged, other than Peterborough which I somehow haven't been back to since the 1980s. You may very well have seen a town or city you haven't been to by now, in which case make a note of what it is. But it turns out I have indeed been to the top 30 English towns and cities, hurrah. It all goes it goes wrong for me at 32...

31Middlesbrough177,000
32Sunderland175,000
33Warrington173,000
34Huddersfield172,000
35York164,000
36Oxford162,000
37Poole159,000
38Slough158,000
39Telford152,000
40Cambridge149,000

Sunderland is the largest English city I haven't been to. In this case I haven't even travelled through it and seen it out of the window, which is a proper fail. That's why today's exercise is important, because I don't have a mental picture of Sunderland based on primary evidence, only what I've seen on TV or read about elsewhere. Warrington I have at least seen from a train speeding through, but Huddersfield is another personal non-event. That's three in a row I've missed, so very much where my run ends.

41Ipswich149,000
42Gloucester148,000
43Blackpool146,000
44Watford141,000
45Colchester138,000
46Preston136,000
47Exeter126,000
48Gateshead122,000
49Oldham121,000
50Blackburn121,000

Shame, I was doing well again there until Oldham tripped me up. I meant to go to Oldham on my last trip to Manchester but it was raining so much that I gave it a miss. Another one for the to-do list.

In case you're still playing, here's the next 50.

51Maidstone61Stockport71Woking81Halifax91Harlow
52Chelmsford62Rotherham72Hemel H'std  82Birkenhead92Guildford
53Basildon63Gillingham73Worcester83Nuneaton93Bracknell
54Cheltenham64Solihull74Salford84Hartlepool94Dudley
55Doncaster65Wakefield75Barnsley85Chesterfield  95Stockton
56Worthing66Sutton C'fld  76Stevenage86Wigan96Scunthorpe
57Eastbourne67Lincoln77Southport87Weston-s-M97Burnley
58Basingstoke  68H Wycombe78Hastings88Grimsby98Redditch
59Rochdale69St Helens79Bedford89Chester99Mansfield
60Crawley70Bath80Darlington 90St Albans100Chatham

I'm quite pleased that I've been to 90% of the top 50 English towns and cities and 84% of the top 100. That's a pretty good record all told, in terms of developing a personal understanding of how the country fits together.

But let's keep this simple by asking...

What's the largest English town you haven't been to?
Mine's Sunderland, what's yours?
Special comments box → comments

Even if you checked out relatively early on, I hope you found the list of towns by population interesting in itself. If nothing else you might get some ideas for where to explore next, once you get the chance.


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