Liverpool

Manchester

Liverpool is a city and metropolitan borough in North West England, with an estimated population of 491,500. Its metropolitan area is the fifth-largest in the UK, with a population of 2.24 million in 2011. The local authority is Liverpool City Council, the most populous local government district in the metropolitan county of Merseyside and the largest in the Liverpool City Region. Liverpool is on the eastern side of the Mersey Estuary, and historically lay within the ancient hundred of West Derby in the southwest of the county of Lancashire. It became a borough in 1207 and a city in 1880. In 1889, it became a county borough independent of Lancashire. Its growth as a major port was paralleled by the expansion of the city throughout the Industrial Revolution. Along with handling general cargo, freight, and raw materials such as coal and cotton, the city merchants were involved in the Atlantic slave trade. In the 19th century, it was a major port of departure for Irish and English emigrants to North America. Liverpool was home to both the Cunard and White Star Line, and was the port of registry of the ocean liner RMS Titanic, the RMS Lusitania, RMS Queen Mary, and RMS Olympic. Liverpool is noted for its culture, architecture, and transport links. It is closely associated with the arts, particularly music; the popularity of the Beatles, who are regarded as the most influential band in history, contributed to the city's status as a tourist destination. Since then, the city has continued to produce hundreds of notable musical acts—musicians from Liverpool have produced 56 No. 1 singles, more than any other city in the world. Liverpool also has a long-standing reputation as the origin of countless actors and actresses, artists, comedians, journalists, novelists, poets, and sportspeople. The city has the second-highest number of art galleries, national museums, and listed buildings in the United Kingdom, with only London having more. In sports, it is best known for being the home of Premier League football clubs Liverpool and Everton; matches between the two are known as the Merseyside derby. The Grand National horse race takes place annually at Aintree Racecourse. Several areas of the city centre were granted World Heritage Site status by UNESCO in 2004. The city celebrated its 800th anniversary in 2007, and was named the 2008 European Capital of Culture together with the Norwegian city of Stavanger. The Liverpool Maritime Mercantile City includes the Pier Head, Albert Dock, and William Brown Street. Liverpool's status as a port city has attracted a diverse population, which was historically drawn from a wide range of cultures and religions, particularly from Ireland and Wales. The city is also home to the oldest black community in the UK and the oldest Chinese community in Europe. Natives and residents of the city of Liverpool are referred to formally as Liverpudlians, but most often as Scousers, a reference to "scouse", a form of stew. The word "Scouse" has also become synonymous with the Liverpool accent and dialect.

Manchester () is a major city and metropolitan borough in Greater Manchester, England, with a population of 545,500 as of 2017 (5th most populous English district). It lies within the United Kingdom's second-most populous urban area, with a population of 2.7 million, and third-most populous metropolitan area, with a population of 3.3 million. It is fringed by the Cheshire Plain to the south, the Pennines to the north and east, and an arc of towns with which it forms a continuous conurbation. The local authority for the city is Manchester City Council. The recorded history of Manchester began with the civilian settlement associated with the Roman fort of Mamucium or Mancunium, which was established in about AD 79 on a sandstone bluff near the confluence of the rivers Medlock and Irwell. It is historically a part of Lancashire, although areas of Cheshire south of the River Mersey were incorporated in the 20th century. The first to be included, Wythenshawe, was added to the city in 1931. Throughout the Middle Ages Manchester remained a manorial township, but began to expand "at an astonishing rate" around the turn of the 19th century. Manchester's unplanned urbanisation was brought on by a boom in textile manufacture during the Industrial Revolution, and resulted in it becoming the world's first industrialised city. Manchester achieved city status in 1853. The Manchester Ship Canal opened in 1894, creating the Port of Manchester and directly linking the city to the Irish Sea, 36 miles (58 km) to the west. Its fortune declined after the Second World War, owing to deindustrialisation, but the IRA bombing in 1996 led to extensive investment and regeneration. Following successful redevelopment after the IRA bombing, Manchester was the host city for the 2002 Commonwealth Games. Manchester is the third most visited city in the UK, after London and Edinburgh. It is notable for its architecture, culture, musical exports, media links, scientific and engineering output, social impact, sports clubs and transport connections. A city of notable firsts, Manchester Liverpool Road railway station was the world's first inter-city passenger railway station. The city has also excelled in scientific advancement, as it was at The University of Manchester in 1917 that scientist Ernest Rutherford first split the atom, in 1948 Frederic C. Williams, Tom Kilburn, and Geoff Tootill developed and built the world's first stored-program computer, and in 2004 Andre Geim and Konstantin Novoselov successfully isolated and characterised the first graphene.