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Irish so-called "cities"

JupiterKid

So Ireland (the Republic) has 5 officially recognised cities but these are really large towns with Dublin being a mid-sized city in the global urban hierarchy.

The entire population of the country is about the same as Greater Manchester and despite people seeing Dublin as a big city, in reality it is a village at heart that is easy to navigate by walking (the city centre is pretty compact) and I'm always bumping into people I know. Compared to big cities such as London, New York and Tokyo, Dublin is small and I like it that way.

Meanwhile, Cork with a population of just over 200k would be a large town in England. Waterford, the smallest city at 50k population would hold the same population of many Dublin suburbs.

What makes a city a city? Is it facilities, amenities, population or something else - that sense of "urban?"

Do you think Dublin is a big city where people rush too much or is it just a big village at heart? There are bungalows in parts of Dublin less than 2 miles from O'Connell St.

What is your ideal size city? I don't like living in cities that are too big. Between 1 million and 5 million population is the ideal size for me.

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Victor

JupiterKid wrote: »

So Ireland (the Republic) has 5 officially recognised cities but these are really large towns with Dublin being a mid-sized city in the global urban hierarchy.

A big fat 'so what?'?

The entire population of the country is about the same as Greater Manchester

You mean Greater Manchester, a collection of cities? Which has a population of about 2,756,200, about 60% of Ireland's population https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Greater_Manchester

What makes a city a city?

In Ireland, the Local Government Act, 2001 (as amended).

johnnyskeleton wrote: »

A cathedral and a charter.

Perhaps in the UK, but not Ireland.

RobertKK wrote: »

Kilkenny is the smallest city

Not a city an more.

Joe_ Public wrote: »

Dublin's a big city by any measure. Population wise, it would comfortably fit inside the top 10 in the US.

Top 30 maybe? Dublin city 553,165 (with suburbs 1,173,179) compared to https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_United_States_cities_by_population

threeball wrote: »

Nearly every half assed village in America calls themselves a City.

Because they use a different definition of city.

please helpThank YOU

Waterford city has been left behind by Ireland sinces the 1980s.

Victor

please helpThank YOU wrote: »

Waterford city has been left behind by Ireland sinces the 1980s.

Get over yourself. The Kilkenny "I'm four and three quarters" complex is only outdone by the Waterford inferiority complex.

please helpThank YOU

in the 1980s you had Dublin , Cork , Limerick , Waterford what happened there with Waterford?

pragmatic1

There's only 3 at a stretch and that's Dublin, Belfast and Cork. But really only Dublin and Belfast.

pragmatic1

Stephen15 wrote: »

Theres only three real cities in Ireland and those are Dublin, Cork and Limerick four if you include Belfast. Dublin being the only fair sized city the rest are reletively small. Galway and Waterford are only large towns.

If we're including the north, drop Limerick and replace it with Derry.

pragmatic1

Mutant z wrote: »

There should be at least a skyscraper or two built in Dublin to at least give it a look of being a modern major city.

I agree, a few skyscrapers would add too the appeal of Dublin. It's going to have to happen sooner or later anyway.

markpb

I could be mistaken but I thought that the Dublin city council area (Ballymun to Ranelagh, Navan road to the coast) had a population of 552,000. If that's the case, the 'city' population is artificially reduced by excluding Blanchardstown, Swords, Palmerstown, Stillorgan, etc which are definitely part of Dublin.

Victor

markpb wrote: »

I could be mistaken but I thought that the Dublin city council area (Ballymun to Ranelagh, Navan road to the coast) had a population of 552,000.

http://www.cso.ie/en/releasesandpublications/ep/p-cpr/censusofpopulation2016-preliminaryresults/geochan/ - There may have been a tweak between preliminary publication and full publication.

If that's the case, the 'city' population is artificially reduced by excluding Blanchardstown, Swords, Palmerstown, Stillorgan, etc which are definitely part of Dublin.

There are different measures of urban population. 'City proper' is one of the common measures.

Persephone kindness

Dublin to me is not a big city. But it's part of it's charm

It's a town

listermint

I can count on one hand where I randomly bumped into people I know when I'm walking the streets of Dublin.

No either you are just going to the local shopping centre all the time op or you have an insane amount of friends but I don't think you've given an accurate depiction of Dublin.

Samaris

blue note wrote: »

I hear people say this a bit. Where does it come from? Is there a link to a definition or something? Is it a dictionary thing, a government thing, is it an old british thing? Or is it just something people from kilkenny say because they have a cathedral and a city charter. Serious question by the way. I am curious as to why people believe this. Is there some, none or loads of truth behind it.

There is truth behind it but now irrelevant. Still, it's where our "classic" cities come from.

Oxford English Dictionary in the early 1800s designated those large settlements with a Church of England cathedral as cities - Dublin, Cork, Derry, Limerick, Waterford, Kilkenny (and Athlone and Cashal, note the lack of Galway!) Belfast became a city in the late 1800s.

Basically, a CoE cathedral and a charter (in which the settlement is referred to as a city - can also do what Armagh did, which was by pointing at some 1700s Parlimentary writs in which Armagh was referred to as a city and saying "thankee kindly, that's us sorted". I think there was some sort of population number taken into account, but I don't know what it was.

City status actually -meant- nothing different from borough or any other regional settlement. It was purely an honorary thing. So from modern perspective, all it means is the chance for some large settlements to thumb their noses at the smaller or newer ones.

thee glitz

Yourself isit wrote: »

That sites statistics are bollocks though.

The graphs are too.

[Deleted User]

Joeytheparrot wrote: »

Sure some of the cities in Northern Ireland are tiny.

Armagh City - 14,749
Newry - 26, 967

Drogheda on its own has roughly that!

[Deleted User]

please helpThank YOU wrote: »

in the 1980s you had Dublin , Cork , Limerick , Waterford what happened there with Waterford?

Galway took its place.

Galwayguy35

Mutant z wrote: »

Limerick feels much more like a city than Galway does, which looks more village like in comparison.

A "village" that seems to be a lot more successful at attracting companies to locate there than Limerick is, strange one that.

Silentcorner

Galwayguy35 wrote: »

A "village" that seems to be a lot more successful at attracting companies to locate there than Limerick is, strange one that.

Galway was included in the EU sponsored BMW region project(Borders, Midlands and West) which was an attempt to help less developed parts of the country, which has in turn benefited Galway...

Have a look at the Industrial/Manufacturing History of both cities over the centuries, there is simple no comparison.

Galway is prolific at attracting tourist tho, I will say that!

md23040

AllForIt wrote: »

I read somewhere and I'm not sure if it's correct, that Dublin has one of the biggest continuous urban sprawls in Europe in terms of distance, not population.

These are the city outline of other major cities overlapped onto Dublin area. The urban density of Australian cities is about 4 times lower than Dublin hence Perth footprint being so large with the same population. I watched the BBC documentary on super cities and having Dublin the size of London would not be a bad thing. Super cities act as a catalyst for their own growth and create more of an internal economy. Ireland needs more tax payers etc given the low population density of the country- as long as it didn't have the two tram and buses as transport infrastructure and had the same structures as London etc (wishing). Also Dublin pop density 50% of London per square kilometre and 25% to Paris.

Anything larger than London is pure misery with LA stretching from Dublin over to Westport. The breath of Ireland is too short for Greater New York area.

http://mapfrappe.com/legacy.html?show=47797 Perth
http://mapfrappe.com/legacy.html?show=47798 Sydney
http://mapfrappe.com/legacy.html?show=47802 London
http://mapfrappe.com/legacy.html?show=47799 Greater Paris
http://mapfrappe.com/legacy.html?show=47800 Los Angeles
http://mapfrappe.com/legacy.html?show=47802 Tokyo

Very happy with the cities of Ireland, there's a social buzz in them, unlike other places like Manchester, Perth and LA. Also Manchester has 1.4m more people living in it but same level of overall GDP at $90bn.

Gentleman Off The Pitch

Victor wrote: »

Get over yourself. The Kilkenny "I'm four and three quarters" complex is only outdone by the Waterford inferiority complex.

Nice posting style...I'd say you're sound!

CelticRambler

blue note wrote: »

I hear people say this a bit. Where does it come from? Is there a link to a definition or something? Is it a dictionary thing, a government thing, is it an old british thing? ... Serious question by the way. I am curious as to why people believe this.

Can't give you a link right now, but the definition you're thinking of/you hear people referring to was based on Norman law, so it applies only to Britain, Ireland and some vestiges of French mediaeval urbanisation.

Yourself isit wrote: »

But Paris is much more compact.

Yeah, but Paris is not considered to be a city by the French - it's referred to as la Ville de Paris - a (big) town.

Annasopra

please helpThank YOU wrote: »

in the 1980s you had Dublin , Cork , Limerick , Waterford what happened there with Waterford?

Galway?

Onthatpoint417

Yourself isit wrote: »

As I said Metropolitan areas in the US can incorporate multiple cities (like the bay area or new York metro) or rural areas like greater Boston.

Wiki says metro Dublin is 1.3M and greater Dublin is 2M. The latter presumably includes commuting towns and counties. (Bray for instance).

In terms of footprint Dublin is far too large. For its population

There's a lot of confusion around definitions between city, urban, metro, and greater.

The city proper is based on the city council area. This, being somewhat arbitrary, can be very misleading. In the UK the council area of Sheffield makes it one of the largest in the UK, while Birmingham's council area is twice the size of Manchester. Where it's useful is in comparing the population of the historic core and Dublin is reasonably big. Remember, in the 18th century Dublin was one of the largest cities in Europe. By this measure Dublin is not far behind Boston and bigger than Manchester. Dublin city centre is quite large for a city of its size.

The urban area is the contiguous urban settlement - the area that is connected without any gaps of countryside . By this measure Dublin falls significantly behind the largest UK cities. But in England many of these urban areas are made up of many large towns that have their separate identity like the mill towns surrounding Manchester. So a large urban population may not be directly correlated with the vibrancy of the main city.

Metro area is a far more nebulous concept and there are often wildly varying estimates. Roughly you could consider it the area in which people commute to work within that city. Dublin's metro area is usually given a very generous definition. The definition of the Greater Dublin area includes Meath, Kildare and Wicklow. But if you took that radius and placed it around many English towns you'd have a population of many millions and in some areas tens of millions.

One of the consequences of this I think it in things like hobby groups that there is a much smaller population to draw on. Compare say setting up a hiking club in Manchester compared to one in Dublin.

please helpThank YOU

Galwayguy35 wrote: »

A "village" that seems to be a lot more successful at attracting companies to locate there than Limerick is, strange one that.

That is not true Galway did not attract Uber, Northern Trust, why is that? The road network in Galway is like your parked in car park. Limerick City road network is `Superior to Galway City . Plus where is the Airport near Galway City? Shannon is right next to Limerick City.

please helpThank YOU

Silentcorner wrote: »

Galway was included in the EU sponsored BMW region project(Borders, Midlands and West) which was an attempt to help less developed parts of the country, which has in turn benefited Galway...

Have a look at the Industrial/Manufacturing History of both cities over the centuries, there is simple no comparison.

Galway is prolific at attracting tourist tho, I will say that!

Limerick City is more of a City feel. than Galway City still feels like a small town with very bad road Infrastructure .

Onthatpoint417

please helpThank YOU wrote: »

That is not true Galway did not attract Uber, Northern Trust, why is that? The road network in Galway is like your parked in car park. Limerick City road network is `Superior to Galway City . Plus where is the Airport near Galway City? Shannon is right next to Limerick City.

Limerick is only 15k ahead of Galway in urban population. And Galway is way ahead in terms of the diversity of its economy. It's a major centre for medical devices production. It's third level institutions are among the best outside Dublin. As a gauge of its magnetism it has the highest proportion of migrants in its population. There's no comparison!

please helpThank YOU

Onthatpoint417 wrote: »

Limerick is only 15k ahead of Galway in urban population. And Galway is way ahead in terms of the diversity of its economy. It's a major centre for medical devices production. It's third level institutions are among the best outside Dublin. As a gauge of its magnetism it has the highest proportion of migrants in its population. There's no comparison!

Limerick UL University?. I Think Galway City knocked Waterford city out in the 1980s but I do not not think it will knock Limerick City out there is way to much power and money there so Nice try Galway.:D

Duff

I know there is probably a ridiculous reason for not having some, but an auld skyscraper or two wouldn't go a miss in Dublin.

please helpThank YOU

I Think the reason Galway City knocked out Waterford City because Waterford City did not have a University?. But Limerick City does but if Limerick City did not have UL University then Galway would have knocked Limerick City out like what happened to Waterford City in the 1980s.

[Deleted User]

Knocked out. Wtf are you on about? I mean that in general as well, not just in this thread.

timthumbni

Stephen15 wrote: »

Belfast is the the only proper city up north

I'm from Northern Ireland and I would agree totally with this.

Newry is an absolute dive and was only given city status to appease the shinner heads after (unionist) Lisburn was going to be given city status. (Or vice versa)

Lisburn and Armagh are the same and Londonderry is also just a rather unappealing largish town (by NI standards anyway)

Belfast feels like a city. A smallish one by world comparison perhaps but a city nonetheless. The rest of the 4 so called cities in Norn Iron have young wans in tractors parked up on the main st on a Saturday night eating a bag of chips ffs.