Town twinning

[Mcr Warrior]

Believe there was a spoof attempt back in April 2004 to twin the vibrant Bedfordshire metropolis that is Luton with its cosmopolitan counterparts in Athens, Dublin and Barcelona.

 

[The exile]

That one made me chuckle the first time I found out about it. I was actually driving through Dull while on holiday and I spotted the signs saying that it was twinned with Boring!

The two towns closest to where I live are twinned with Hersbruck (Lossiemouth) and Landshut (Elgin), both of which are in Bavaria. I'm not entirely sure why, but the connections have existed for a while. Elgin has a bridge called the Landshut Bridge, apparently (I only found this out when I looked it up on Wikipedia - usual caveats apply).

Scotland /Bavaria twinnings are fairly common - there are good cultural / historical reasons.

What is the point of town twinning?

Done well, furthering of commercial and economic ties, cultural understanding etc. Done badly, an excuse for a jolly (fine - as long as it doesn’t involve public money). Like many things, some work well; some are merely symbolic.

 

[Calthrop]

Living just outside Sandwich in Kent, I occasionally tell gullible friends and guests that the town is twinned with Baguette in France and with Pannini in Italy.
I wish I had the resources to create an appropriate twinning sign for April fools day.

I was going to be all witty and expand on this "flight of fancy" of yours, re a possible twin in Germany; but discovered that the German for "sandwich" is in fact -- Sandwich.

 

[The exile]

I was going to be all witty and expand on this "flight of fancy" of yours, re a possible twin in Germany; but discovered that the German for "sandwich" is in fact -- Sandwich.

Though Butterbrot would be a non “Denglisch” version.

Though Butterbrot would be a non “Denglisch” version.

Any takers for the German / Austrian settlements of Wankum, Kissing or F***ing?

 

[adc82140]

F***ing could be twinned with Hell in Norway.

Or ****t in Shetland.

 

[SteveM70]

What is the point of town twinning?

Helps when planning holidays / trips overseas, you see “twinned with Corby” and quickly decide to go somewhere else

F***ing could be twinned with Hell in Norway.

Or ****t in Shetland.

Boring (Scotland) is twinned with Boring (Oregon)

 

[Greetlander]

Halifax is twinned with Aachen - I think it’s an early post-ww2 making friends arrangement. I don’t think it’s twinned with any of the Halifax’s around the world which seems a bit of an oversight.

 

[Calthrop]

Bridgnorth just up the road from me is twinned with 2 German towns!

Regarding towns in nation A, being twinned with more than one town in nation B: have just happened on an instance which tempts one a bit, to the adjective "greedy" -- Arnhem (Netherlands) has three twin (triplet? quadruplet?) towns in the UK: Croydon, Coventry, and Airdrie (North Lanarkshire).

 

[32475]

F***ing could be twinned with Hell in Norway.

Or ****t in Shetland.

****t is in Orkney.
I made a point of going there a few years ago and also to Hell

 

[adc82140]

****t is in Orkney.
I made a point of going there a few years ago and also to Hell

It seems both Shetland and Orkney have ****ts.

 

[32475]

It seems both Shetland and Orkney have ****ts.

I wonder if they are twinned? They certainly should be!

 

[3141]

Living just outside Sandwich in Kent, I occasionally tell gullible friends and guests that the town is twinned with Baguette in France and with Pannini in Italy.
I wish I had the resources to create an appropriate twinning sign for April fools day.

A friend of mine, who lived in Melton Mowbray, told me this story many years ago.

A substantial employer in Melton is Pedigree Petfood, which is part of the Mars organisation. There was some resentment that Pedigree Petfood used its position to get what it wanted in planning and other matters, with a veiled threat that if it didn't get its way it might move elsewhere. One morning residents discovered that, overnight, the signs saying Melton Mowbray on all the main roads entering the town had had "Twinned with Mars" added. They were removed very quickly.

 

[Railsigns]

F***ing could be twinned with Hell in Norway.

Alas, the time for that has passed, since the first village was renamed as Fugging two years ago.

 

[Calthrop]

There are even some villages that have twin villages. For example Manorbier, on the Pembrokeshire coast in south Wales, is twinned with Vernou-la-Celle-sur-Seine, France. Does anyone know of any other examples of twin villages?

I've just come across what might be reckoned an instance of this: twinning between the large village or very small town of Storrington, West Sussex; and Villerest -- by implication, a place of comparable size -- near Roanne in the French departement of Loire.

 

[GrimsbyPacer]

Grimsby, England is twinned with Bremerhaven, Deutschland both are similar industrial coastal towns, once a tall ship travelled between the two... but otherwise, I have not seen any material results from the twinning.

Twinning seems to be a pointless political exercise in most cases.

 

[dangie]

I don’t think I’d be far off the mark if you did a poll in my town and asked two questions:

1. Who is the town of Rugeley twinned with?
2. Why is the Western Springs Road so named?

I‘d guess that most under the age of 20 wouldn’t know.

Note: Rugeley is twinned with Western Springs Illinois USA.

 

[PsychoMouse]

Brum is twinned with a bunch of 'second cities'; Chicago, Frankfurt, Lyon, Milan and Guangzhou spring to mind but there's probably more.

 

[Calthrop]

Musing on a matter which has been aired in this thread -- degrees of resemblance, and lack thereof, between British towns and their "twins" abroad; I chanced today, to discover which are the twin towns, in France and in Germany: of Buxton, Derbyshire. Buxton's French twin is a place called Oignies, which I had never heard of before -- a former coal-mining town, now engaged in light industry: in the industrial belt -- in drab, low-lying scenery -- in the far north of France, near the Belgian border ("World War I country"). Except for mining (not, as far as I know, for coal) having long been a big-time thing around Buxton in past centuries -- it would seem hard to imagine two settlements with less in common with each other.

Buxton's twin town in Germany, however, is Bad Nauheim: a spa town in west-central Germany, in the lower reaches of the Taunus mountain range -- hill-country anyway, even if seemingly a bit "tame" in comparison with the Peak District. Infinitely more Buxton-like, one feels, than its French counterpart. Just, an interesting contrast between the two twinning situations, re "like and unlike".

 

[AY1975]

Brum is twinned with a bunch of 'second cities'; Chicago, Frankfurt, Lyon, Milan and Guangzhou spring to mind but there's probably more.

And Leipzig.

Musing on a matter which has been aired in this thread -- degrees of resemblance, and lack thereof, between British towns and their "twins" abroad; I chanced today, to discover which are the twin towns, in France and in Germany: of Buxton, Derbyshire. Buxton's French twin is a place called Oignies, which I had never heard of before -- a former coal-mining town, now engaged in light industry: in the industrial belt -- in drab, low-lying scenery -- in the far north of France, near the Belgian border ("World War I country"). Except for mining (not, as far as I know, for coal) having long been a big-time thing around Buxton in past centuries -- it would seem hard to imagine two settlements with less in common with each other.

Buxton's twin town in Germany, however, is Bad Nauheim: a spa town in west-central Germany, in the lower reaches of the Taunus mountain range -- hill-country anyway, even if seemingly a bit "tame" in comparison with the Peak District. Infinitely more Buxton-like, one feels, than its French counterpart. Just, an interesting contrast between the two twinning situations, re "like and unlike".

Maybe the connection with the mining industry was the main reason, or at least one of the main reasons, for choosing Oignies as Buxton's French twin town.

 

[Springs Branch]

Have often wondered whether the key criterion to be decided was whether the twinned town was likely to be worthwhile visiting by councillors on a week's "jolly".

Musing on a matter which has been aired in this thread -- degrees of resemblance, and lack thereof, between British towns and their "twins" abroad . . . .
Buxton's French twin is a place called Oignies, which I had never heard of before -- a former coal-mining town, now engaged in light industry: in the industrial belt -- in drab, low-lying scenery -- in the far north of France, near the Belgian border ("World War I country"). Except for mining (not, as far as I know, for coal) having long been a big-time thing around Buxton - it would seem hard to imagine two settlements with less in common with each other.

On occasions in the past (long before this thread) I've pondered on the rationale behind twinning Wigan with the French city of Angers.

Angers is a historical intellectual centre and university town (allegedly once known as The Athens of the West), with a castle, cathedral and medieval quarter on a rocky promontory dominating the surrounding area and was the cradle of the Plantagenet dynasty. Angers is located in the Loire wine growing region and was the original home of Cointreau. So it's more like a Durham or a Lincoln or, at a pinch, York than a Wigan.

The mention of Oignies (where?) made me wonder if that would be a more like-for-like twin town for Wigan.

Maybe I've been uncharitable in imagining a gaggle of well-fed and rosy-cheeked Wigan councillors returning from a ratepayer-funded "cultural exchange", struggling through the airport with their excess baggage clinking and chinking with bottles of local produce obtained from "fact finding" visits to the local chateaux and hypermarkets?

 

[Calthrop]

Maybe the connection with the mining industry was the main reason, or at least one of the main reasons, for choosing Oignies as Buxton's French twin town.

Certainly the only conceivable reason which I could see (short of application of the "Whitstable method", involving picking towns which are as different as possible, from one's own ); and appeared to me, a bit of a far-fetched one. As mentioned by me -- mining for different minerals (I very much think, anyway) -- and otherwise, great dissimilarity between an up-market spa, high up in the hills of a renownedly beautiful national-park area; and a seemingly dismal, run-down former mining settlement in a coalfield in what is anyway drab and low-lying country -- generally reckoned the least visually attractive part of France -- though no doubt many lovely people live there...

On occasions in the past (long before this thread) I've pondered on the rationale behind twinning Wigan with the French city of Angers.

Angers is a historical intellectual centre and university town (allegedly once known as The Athens of the West), with a castle, cathedral and medieval quarter on a rocky promontory dominating the surrounding area and was the cradle of the Plantagenet dynasty. Angers is located in the Loire wine growing region and was the original home of Cointreau.

The mention of Oignies (where?) made me wonder if that would be a more like-for-like twin town for Wigan.

Maybe I've been uncharitable in imagining a gaggle of well-fed and rosy-cheeked Wigan councillors returning from a ratepayer-funded "cultural exchange", struggling through the airport with their excess baggage clinking and chinking with bottles of local produce obtained from "fact finding" visits to the local chateaux and hypermarkets?

Wigan / Angers would indeed certainly appear on the face of it, highly placed in the "incongruous pairings" stakes. Oignies (would indeed seem an obscure-ish joint; as mentioned, I'd never heard of it before this thread; and it doesn't feature on the -- decent-scale -- map in my Philip's Great World Atlas) truly, feels a more suitable Wigan-counterpart. (Fantasy paints a French equivalent of George Orwell exploring the more dingy and desperate industrial parts of France in the 1930s Depression, and penning a work La Route a la Jetee d'Oignies...)

 

[61653 HTAFC]

All these foreign places that get entire roads named after them in provincial English towns must be thrilled... Huddersfield's two twin towns (Besançon in France and Unna in Germany) only get a flyover and dive-under on the ring-road respectively.

The Unna twinning is quite fitting as it's roughly the same distance from Dortmund as Huddersfield is from Leeds, the two respective larger places are also twinned as mentioned above.

I think my former home Taunton's twinning with Lisieux is no longer active, as during my time living there the road "Lisieux Way" was renamed "Chritchard Way".

On occasions in the past (long before this thread) I've pondered on the rationale behind twinning Wigan with the French city of Angers.

The village of Mardy in Monmouthshire would be a more fitting twin for Angers, surely?

 

[Calthrop]

The village of Mardy in Monmouthshire would be a more fitting twin for Angers, surely?

I wanted to add in Zorndorf, Germany; but since 1945 it's been Sarbinowo, Poland -- drat it.

 

[WatcherZero]

Wigan has maintained a twinning with Angers in France since 1978 (though it became official in 1988), it was originally set up for educational links as they had similarly sized colleges and they maintain a healthy school exchange program. There were other twins over the years with towns in Germany and the US I believe but they have lapsed and never really had any degree of regular interaction. The school exchanges seems to be the key to maintaining a good link.

 

[AY1975]

All these foreign places that get entire roads named after them in provincial English towns must be thrilled... Huddersfield's two twin towns (Besançon in France and Unna in Germany) only get a flyover and dive-under on the ring-road respectively.

Likewise, Sheffield is twinned with Bochum (an industrial city like Sheffield) and has a ring road named Bochum Parkway. It is also twinned with Donetsk, Ukraine, and has a road (and a tram stop) named Donetsk Way.

The Unna twinning is quite fitting as it's roughly the same distance from Dortmund as Huddersfield is from Leeds, the two respective larger places are also twinned as mentioned above.

Similarly, Chesterfield is twinned with Darmstadt, and I would guess that Chesterfield is a similar distance from Sheffield as Darmstadt is from Frankfurt.

Chesterfield is also twinned with Troyes in the Champagne wine region of France. There I would say the most obvious similarities are having a lot of half-timbered houses and being in sparkling wine country (at least in that Chesterfield has the vineyard at Renishaw Hall nearby!).

Certainly the only conceivable reason which I could see (short of application of the "Whitstable method", involving picking towns which are as different as possible, from one's own ); and appeared to me, a bit of a far-fetched one. As mentioned by me -- mining for different minerals (I very much think, anyway) -- and otherwise, great dissimilarity between an up-market spa, high up in the hills of a renownedly beautiful national-park area; and a seemingly dismal, run-down former mining settlement in a coalfield in what is anyway drab and low-lying country -- generally reckoned the least visually attractive part of France -- though no doubt many lovely people live there...

Wigan / Angers would indeed certainly appear on the face of it, highly placed in the "incongruous pairings" stakes. Oignies (would indeed seem an obscure-ish joint; as mentioned, I'd never heard of it before this thread; and it doesn't feature on the -- decent-scale -- map in my Philip's Great World Atlas) truly, feels a more suitable Wigan-counterpart. (Fantasy paints a French equivalent of George Orwell exploring the more dingy and desperate industrial parts of France in the 1930s Depression, and penning a work La Route a la Jetee d'Oignies...)

Wigan has maintained a twinning with Angers in France since 1978 (though it became official in 1988), it was originally set up for educational links as they had similarly sized colleges and they maintain a healthy school exchange program. There were other twins over the years with towns in Germany and the US I believe but they have lapsed and never really had any degree of regular interaction. The school exchanges seems to be the key to maintaining a good link.

A case of "opposites attract", perhaps? By twinning a largely working class industrial town with a largely middle class university town, the people of each of those towns might get more of an insight into how the other half lives. They say that travel broadens the mind, which is certainly true, and finding out how people live (and think) whose social and economic background is different from one's own can also broaden the mind.

 

[MotCO]

Kingston upon Thames was (and presumably still is) twinned with Delft in Holland. No idea why.

 

[AY1975]

Kingston upon Thames was (and presumably still is) twinned with Delft in Holland. No idea why.

And the borough of Croydon is twinned with Arnhem, Netherlands, and Richmond-upon-Thames is twinned with Fontainebleau, France, and Konstanz, Germany (and Richmond, Virginia, USA as mentioned in entry #1 at the start of this thread).

I believe that the borough of Lewisham is (or was) twinned with one of the districts or Bezirke of Berlin. Not sure if any other London boroughs are twinned with anywhere.

 

[Acey]

And the borough of Croydon is twinned with Arnhem, Netherlands, and Richmond-upon-Thames is twinned with Fontainebleau, France, and Konstanz, Germany (and Richmond, Virginia, USA as mentioned in entry #1 at the start of this thread).

I believe that the borough of Lewisham is (or was) twinned with one of the districts or Bezirke of Berlin. Not sure if any other London boroughs are twinned with anywhere.

Bromley is twinned with Neuwied ,Germany ,sincerely hope it's not as dull as Bromley !

 

[sprunt]

I believe that the borough of Lewisham is (or was) twinned with one of the districts or Bezirke of Berlin. Not sure if any other London boroughs are twinned with anywhere.

Hounslow is twinned with Issy-les-Molineaux, a commune on the edge of Paris.

Whitstandwell, Rutland (population 41 according to Wikipedia) is twinned with Paris!

 

[Trackman]

Bromley is twinned with Neuwied ,Germany ,sincerely hope it's not as dull as Bromley !

Hang, I like Bromely. In fact it was named the best place to live in London not long since.