   #copyright

Bristol

2007 Schools Wikipedia Selection. Related subjects: Geography of Great
Britain

   CAPTION: Bristol

   Image:EnglandBristol.png
   Geography
          Status         Ceremonial county,
                         City and Unitary district
          Region         South West England
           Area
   - Total
   - District            Ranked 47th
                         110 km²
                         Ranked 237th
         Admin HQ        Bristol
        ISO 3166-2       GB-BST
         ONS code        00HB
    Traditional county   County corporate
                         ( Gloucestershire
                         and Somerset)
     OS grid reference   ST5946972550
        Coordinates      51°27'N 2°35'W
          NUTS 3         UKK11
   Demographics
        Population
   - Total (2005 est.)
   - Density
   - District            Ranked 43rd
                         398,300
                         3,639 / km²
                         Ranked 7th
         Ethnicity       91.8% White
                         2.9% S. Asian
                         2.3% Afro-Caribbean
                         2.08% Mixed Race
   Politics
                Bristol City Council
   http://www.bristol-city.gov.uk/
          Control        No overall control
                         Lib Dem Minority
        Leadership       Leader & Cabinet
         Executive       Liberal Democrats
   Members of Parliament
                           * Roger Berry
                           * Kerry McCarthy
                           * Doug Naysmith
                           * Dawn Primarolo
                           * Stephen Williams

   Bristol ( IPA: [ˈbrɪstəl]) is a city, unitary authority and ceremonial
   county in South West England, 115 miles (185 km) west of London and
   located at 51°27′14″N, 2°35′48″W

   With a population of 400,000, and metropolitan area of 550,000, it is
   England's sixth, and the United Kingdom's ninth, most populous city,
   and one of England's core cities. It received a royal charter in 1155
   and was granted county status in 1373. For half a millennium it was the
   second or third largest English city, until the rapid rise of
   Liverpool, Manchester and Birmingham in the Industrial Revolution of
   the 1780s. It borders on the unitary districts of Bath and North East
   Somerset, North Somerset and South Gloucestershire, and has a short
   coastline on the Bristol Channel.

   Bristol is one of the main centres of culture, employment and education
   in the region. From its earliest days, its prosperity has been linked
   to that of the Port of Bristol, the commercial port, which was in the
   city centre but has now moved to the Bristol Channel coast at Avonmouth
   and Portbury. In more recent years the economy has been built on the
   aerospace industry, and the city centre docks have been regenerated as
   a centre of heritage and culture. The city is famous for its unique
   music and film industries, and was a finalist for the 2008 European
   Capital of Culture.

History

   There is evidence of settlement in the Bristol area from the
   palaeolithic era, with 60,000-year-old archaeological finds at
   Shirehampton and St Annes. There are iron age hill forts near the city,
   at Leigh Woods and Clifton Down on the side of the Avon Gorge, and on
   Kingsweston Hill, near Henbury. During the Roman era there was a
   settlement, Abona, at what is now Sea Mills, connected to Bath by Roman
   road, and another settlement at what is now Inns Court. There were also
   isolated villas and small settlements throughout the area.

   The town of Brycgstow (Old English, "the place at the bridge") was in
   existence by the beginning of the 11th century, and under Norman rule
   acquired one of the strongest castles in southern England. The River
   Avon in the city centre has slowly evolved into Bristol Harbour, and
   since the 12th century the harbour has been an important port, handling
   much of England's trade with Ireland. In 1247 a new bridge was built
   and the town was extended to incorporate neighbouring suburbs, becoming
   in 1373 a county in its own right. During this period Bristol also
   became a centre of shipbuilding and manufacturing. Bristol was the
   starting point for many important voyages, notably John Cabot's 1497
   voyage of exploration to North America.

   By the 14th century Bristol was England's third-largest town (after
   London and York), with perhaps 15-20,000 inhabitants on the eve of the
   Black Death of 1348-49. The plague inflicted a prolonged pause in the
   growth of Bristol's population, with numbers remaining at 10-12,000
   through most of the 15th and 16th centuries. The Diocese of Bristol was
   founded in 1542, with the former Abbey of St Augustine becoming Bristol
   Cathedral. Traditionally this is equivalent to the town being granted
   city status. During the 1640s Civil War the city suffered through
   Royalist military occupation and plague.
   Bristol Bridge seen across the Harbour
   Enlarge
   Bristol Bridge seen across the Harbour

   Renewed growth came with the 17th-century rise of England's American
   colonies and the rapid 18th-century expansion of England's part in the
   Atlantic trade in Africans taken for slavery in the Americas. Bristol,
   along with Liverpool, became a significant centre for the slave trade
   although few slaves were brought to Britain. During the height of the
   slave trade, from 1700 to 1807, more than 2000 slaving ships were
   fitted out at Bristol, carrying a (conservatively) estimated half a
   million people from Africa to the Americas and slavery. Fishermen who
   left Bristol were long part of the migratory fishery to the Grand Banks
   of Newfoundland and began settling that island permanently in larger
   numbers around this time. Bristol's strong nautical ties meant that
   maritime safety was an important issue in the city, In the 19th century
   Samuel Plimsoll, "the sailor's friend", campaigned fearlessly to make
   the seas safer. He was shocked by the scandal of overloaded cargoes and
   successfully fought for a compulsory loadline on ships.

   Competition from Liverpool from c.1760, the disruption of maritime
   commerce through war with France (1793) and the abolition of the slave
   trade (1807) contributed to the city's failure to keep pace with the
   newer manufacturing centres of the North and Midlands. The long passage
   up the heavily tidal Avon Gorge, which had made the port highly secure
   during the middle ages, had become a liability which the construction
   of a new "Floating Harbour" (designed by William Jessop) in 1804–9
   failed to overcome. Nevertheless, Bristol's population (66,000 in 1801)
   quintupled during the 19th century, supported by new industries and
   growing commerce. It was particularly associated with the Victorian
   engineer Isambard Kingdom Brunel, who designed the Great Western
   Railway between Bristol and London, two pioneering Bristol-built
   steamships, and the Clifton Suspension Bridge. John Wesley founded the
   very first Methodist Chapel, in Bristol in 1739.
   Clifton Suspension Bridge
   Enlarge
   Clifton Suspension Bridge

   Bristol's city centre suffered severe damage from bombing during World
   War II. The original central shopping area, near the bridge and castle,
   is now a park containing two bombed out churches and some tiny
   fragments of the castle. A third bombed church nearby, St Nicholas, has
   been restored and currently houses private city council offices despite
   containing a triptych by William Hogarth, painted for the high altar of
   St Mary Redcliffe in 1756. Like much British post-war planning, the
   rebuilding of Bristol city centre was characterised by large, cheap
   tower blocks, brutalist architecture and expansion of roads. Since the
   1980s this trend has changed with the closure of some main roads, the
   restoration of the Georgian period Queen's and Portland Squares, the
   current demolition and rebuilding of the Broadmead shopping centre and,
   in 2006, one of the city centre's tallest post-war blocks was torn
   down. The removal of the docks to Avonmouth, seven miles (11 km)
   downstream from the city centre has also allowed substantial corporate
   redevelopment of the old central dock area (the " Floating Harbour") in
   recent decades, although at one time the continued existence of the
   docks was in jeopardy as it was viewed as a derelict industrial site
   rather than a potential asset.

Economy and industry

   The last ever flight of any Concorde, 26 November 2003. The aircraft is
   seen a few minutes before landing on the Filton runway from which she
   first flew in 1969.
   Enlarge
   The last ever flight of any Concorde, 26 November 2003. The aircraft is
   seen a few minutes before landing on the Filton runway from which she
   first flew in 1969.

   As well as Bristol's nautical connections, the city's economy is
   reliant on the aerospace industry, the media, information technology
   and financial services sectors and tourism. In 1998 Bristol's GDP was
   £6.224 billion GBP, and the combined GDP of South Gloucestershire,
   North Somerset and B&NES was £6.98 billion. The GDP per head was
   £15,472, making the city more affluent than the UK as a whole, at 23%
   above the national average. This makes it the second-highest per-capita
   GDP of an English city, after London, and 34th in the European Union,
   as well as the only English core city with a GDP above the national
   average. In December 2005, Bristol's unemployment rate was 5.2%,
   compared to 3.6% for the south west and 4.8% for the United Kingdom.

   While Bristol's economy is no longer reliant upon its port, the city is
   the largest importer of cars to the UK. Since the port was leased in
   1991, £330 million has been invested and the annual tonnage throughput
   has increased from 4m tonnes to 12m tonnes. The financial services
   sector employs 40,000 in the city, and the hi-tech sector is important,
   with 400 micro-electronics and silicon design companies, as well as the
   Hewlett-Packard national research laboratories. Bristol is the UK's
   seventh most popular destination for foreign tourists, and the city
   receives nine million visitors each year.

   In the 20th century, Bristol's manufacturing activities expanded to
   include aircraft production at Filton, by the Bristol Aeroplane
   Company, and aero-engine manufacture by Bristol Aero Engines (later
   Rolls-Royce) at Patchway. The aeroplane company became famous for the
   World War I Bristol Fighter, and Second World War Blenheim and
   Beaufighter aircraft. In the 1950s it became one of the country's major
   manufacturers of civil aircraft, with the Bristol Freighter and
   Britannia and the huge Brabazon airliner. The Bristol Aeroplane Company
   diversified into car manufacturing in the 1940s, building luxury
   hand-built cars at their factory in Filton, under the name Bristol
   Cars, which became independent from the Bristol Aeroplane Company in
   1960.

   In the 1960s Filton played a key role in the Anglo-French Concorde
   supersonic airliner project. Concorde components were manufactured in
   British and French factories and shipped to the two final assembly
   plants, in Toulouse and Filton. The French manufactured the centre
   fuselage and centre wing and the British the nose, rear fuselage, fin
   and wingtips, while the Rolls-Royce/Snecma 593 engine's manufacture was
   split between Rolls-Royce (Filton) and SNECMA (Paris). The British
   Concorde prototype made its maiden flight from Filton to RAF Fairford
   on 9 April 1969, five weeks after the French test flight. In 2003 the
   companies running Concorde made the decision to cease flying the
   aircraft and to retire them to locations (mostly museums) around the
   world. On 26 November 2003, Concorde 216 made the final Concorde
   flight, returning to Filton airfield to be kept there permanently as
   the centrepiece of a projected air museum. This museum will include the
   existing Bristol Aero Collection, which includes a Bristol Britannia
   aircraft.

   The major aerospace companies in Bristol now are BAE Systems, Airbus
   and Rolls-Royce, all based at Filton. Another important aviation
   company in the city is Cameron Balloons, the world's largest
   manufacturer of hot air balloons. Annually, in August, the city is host
   to the Bristol International Balloon Fiesta, one of Europe's largest
   hot air balloon events.
   Panorama over Bristol
   Panorama over Bristol

Culture

   The city has two League football clubs: Bristol City who play in League
   One and Bristol Rovers who play in League Two, as well as a number of
   non-league clubs. The city is also home to Bristol Rugby rugby union
   club, which has won promotion to the Guinness Premiership, a
   first-class cricket side, Gloucestershire C.C.C. and a Rugby League
   Conference side, the Bristol Sonics. The city also stages an annual
   half marathon, and in 2001 played host to the World Half Marathon
   Championships.
   The Coopers Hall, entrance to the BOV Theatre Royal complex.
   Enlarge
   The Coopers Hall, entrance to the BOV Theatre Royal complex.

   In summer the grounds of Ashton Court to the west of the city play host
   to the Bristol International Balloon Fiesta, a major event for hot-air
   ballooning in the UK. The Fiesta draws a substantial crowd even for the
   early morning lift that typically begins at about 6.30 am. Events and a
   fairground entertain the crowds during the day. A second mass ascent is
   then made in the early evening, again taking advantage of lower wind
   speeds. Ashton Court also plays host to the Ashton Court festival each
   summer, an outdoors music festival which used to be known as the
   Bristol Community Festival.

   The city's principal theatre company, the Bristol Old Vic, was founded
   in 1946 as an offshoot of the Old Vic company in London. Its premises
   on King Street consist of the 1766 Theatre Royal (400 seats), a modern
   studio theatre called the New Vic (150 seats), and foyer and bar areas
   in the adjacent Coopers' Hall (built 1743). The Theatre Royal is a
   grade I listed building and the oldest continuously-operating theatre
   in England. The Prestigious Bristol Old Vic Theatre School, which had
   originated in King street is now a separate company. The Bristol
   Hippodrome is a larger theatre (1981 seats) which hosts national
   touring productions, while the 2000-seat Colston Hall, named after
   Edward Colston, is the city's main concert venue. Other theatres
   include the Tobacco Factory, QEH and Redgrave Theatres. Bristol is home
   to many live music venues, of which The Old Duke is perhaps the best
   known.

   The music scene is thriving and significant. From the late 1970s
   onwards it was home to a crop of cultish bands combining punk, funk,
   dub and political consciousness, the most celebrated being The Pop
   Group. Ten years later, Bristol was the birthplace of a type of English
   hip-hop music called trip hop or the "Bristol Sound", epitomised in the
   work of artists such as Tricky, Portishead, Smith & Mighty and Massive
   Attack. It is also a stronghold of drum n bass with notable artists
   such as the Mercury Prize winning Roni Size /Reprazent and Kosheen as
   well as the pioneering DJ Krust and More Rockers. This music is part of
   the wider Bristol urban culture scene which received international
   media attention in the 1990s and still thrives today.

   The Bristol City Museum and Art Gallery houses a collection of natural
   history, archaeology, local glassware, Chinese ceramics and art. The
   Bristol Industrial Museum, on the dockside, shows local industrial
   heritage and operates a steam railway, boat trips, and working dockside
   cranes. The City Museum also runs three preserved historic houses: the
   Tudor Red Lodge, the Georgian House, and Blaise Castle House. The
   Watershed Media Centre and Arnolfini gallery, both in disused dockside
   warehouses, exhibit contemporary art, photography and cinema.
   The Llandoger Trow, an ancient public house in the heart of Bristol
   Enlarge
   The Llandoger Trow, an ancient public house in the heart of Bristol

   Stop frame animation films and commercials painstakingly produced by
   Aardman Animations and high quality television series focusing on the
   natural world have also brought fame and artistic credit to the city.
   The city is home to the regional headquarters of BBC West, and the BBC
   Natural History Unit. Locations in and around Bristol often feature in
   the BBC's natural history programmes, including the cult children's
   television programme Animal Magic, filmed at Bristol Zoo.

   In literature Bristol is noted as the birth place of Thomas Chatterton,
   chief poet of the 18th-century Gothic literary revival, England's
   youngest writer of mature verse, and precursor of the Romantic
   movement. Robert Southey was born in Wine Street, Bristol in 1774,
   Samuel Taylor Coleridge and Southey married the Bristol Fricker
   sisters; and William Wordsworth spent time in the city where Joseph
   Cottle first published Lyrical Ballads in 1798.

   The 18th and 19th century portrait painter Sir Thomas Lawrence and 19th
   century architect Francis Greenway, designer of many of Sydney's first
   buildings, came from the city, and more recently the infamous graffiti
   artist Banksy. Many famous comedians are locals, including Justin Lee
   Collins, Lee Evans, and writer/comedian Stephen Merchant. Bristol
   University has given us the satirist Chris Morris, Simon Pegg and Nick
   Frost of Spaced and Shaun of the Dead and Matt Lucas and David Walliams
   of Little Britain fame. Hollywood actor Cary Grant was born in the
   city, Patrick Stewart, Jane Lapotaire, Pete Postlethwaite, Jeremy
   Irons, Greta Scacchi, Miranda Richardson, Helen Baxendale, Daniel
   Day-Lewis, Gene Wilder and Tony Robinson ( Blackadder) are amongst the
   many actors who learnt their craft at the world famous Bristol Old Vic
   Theatre School, opened by Sir Lawrence Olivier in 1946 and Hugo Weaving
   ( Agent Smith, The Matrix) studied at Queen Elizabeth's Hospital
   School.

   Bristol has a daily morning newspaper, the Western Daily Press; an
   evening paper, the Evening Post; a weekly free newspaper, the Bristol
   Observer; and a Bristol edition of the free Metro newspaper. The local
   weekly listings magazine, Venue, covers the city's music, theatre and
   arts scenes. All of these papers are owned by the Northcliffe Group.
   The city has several local radio stations, including BBC Radio Bristol,
   GWR FM, Classic Gold 1260 and a university station, The Hub.

   A distinctive dialect of English is spoken in Bristol (known
   colloquially as Brizzle or Bristle). Unusually for an urban area of
   England, this is a rhotic dialect, in which the r in words like car is
   pronounced. It is perhaps this element of the dialect which has led
   outsiders to dub it "farmer speech". The most unusual feature of this
   dialect, unique to Bristol, is the Bristol L (or terminal L), in which
   an L sound is appended to words that end in a letter a. Thus "area"
   becomes "areal", etc. This is how the city's name evolved from
   Brycgstow to have a final 'L' sound: Bristol. Further Bristolian
   linguistic features are:-
     * The addition of a superfluous "to" in questions relating to
       direction or orientation, or using "to" instead of "at".
     * Using male pronouns "he", "him" instead of "it".

   For example, "Where's that?" would be phrased as "Where's he to?", a
   feature exported to Newfoundland English.

Politics and government

   St Mary Redcliffe church and the Floating Harbour, Bristol
   Enlarge
   St Mary Redcliffe church and the Floating Harbour, Bristol

   Bristol City Council consists of 70 councillors representing 35 wards.
   They are elected in thirds with two councillors per ward, each serving
   a four-year term. Wards never have both councillors up for election at
   the same time, so effectively two-thirds of the wards are up each
   election. The Council has long been dominated by the Labour Party, but
   recently the Liberal Democrats have grown strong in the city and took
   minority control of the Council in 2005. The Council Leader is Liberal
   Democrat Councillor Barbara Janke and the Lord Mayor is Conservative
   Councillor Peter Abraham.

   Bristol's constituencies in the House of Commons cross the borders with
   neighbouring authorities, and the city is divided into Bristol West,
   East, South and North-west and Kingswood. Northavon also covers some of
   the suburbs, but none of the administrative county. At the next General
   Election, the boundaries will be changed to coincide with the county
   boundary. Kingswood will no longer cover any of the county, and a new
   Filton and Bradley Stoke constituency will include the suburbs in South
   Gloucestershire. There are currently four Labour and one Liberal
   Democrat Members of Parliaments.

   Bristol has a tradition of local political activism, and has been home
   to many important political figures. Tony Benn, a veteran left-wing
   politician, was Member of Parliament (MP) for Bristol South East from
   1950 to 1983. Edmund Burke, MP for the Bristol constituency for six
   years from 1774, famously insisted that he was a Member of Parliament
   first, rather than a representative of his constituents' interests. In
   1963, Paul Stephenson led a boycott of the city's buses after the
   Bristol Omnibus Co. refused to employ black drivers and conductors. The
   boycott is known to have influenced the creation of the UK's Race
   Relations Act in 1965. The women's rights campaigner Emmeline
   Pethick-Lawrence (1867–1954) was born in Bristol. Local support of fair
   trade issues was recognised in 2005 when Bristol was granted Fairtrade
   City status.

   Bristol is unusual in having been a city with county status since
   medieval times. The county was expanded to include suburbs such as
   Clifton in 1835, and it was named a county borough in 1889, when the
   term was first introduced. However, on 1 April 1974, it became a local
   government district of the short-lived county of Avon. On 1 April 1996,
   it once again regained its independence and county status, when the
   county of Avon was abolished and Bristol became a Unitary Authority.

Demographics

   Looking across the Broadmead Shopping Centre from a balloon at 500 feet
   Enlarge
   Looking across the Broadmead Shopping Centre from a balloon at 500 feet

   In 2004 the Office for National Statistics estimated the county's
   population at 393,900, making it the 47th-largest ceremonial county in
   England. Using Census 2001 data the ONS estimated the contiguous
   built-up area to be 420,556, and metropolitan area to be 550,000. This
   makes the city England's sixth most populous city, and seventh most
   populous metropolitan area. At 3,599 people per square kilometre it has
   the seventh-highest population density of any English district.

   In the 2001 census 91.83% of the population described themselves as
   white, 2.85% as South Asian, 2.32% as black, 2.08% as mixed race, 0.56%
   as Chinese and 0.34% other. National averages were 90.92%, 4.58%, 2.3%,
   1.31%, 0.45% and 0.44% for the same groups. Sixty percent of Bristol's
   population registered their religion as Christianity, and 25% as not
   religious in the 2001 census, compared to 72% and 15% nationally. Two
   percent of the population follow Islam (3% nationally), with no other
   religion above one percent. Bristol had the ninth highest proportion of
   people refer to their religion in the last census as 'Jedi'.

Physical geography

   The Avon Gorge, home to several unique plant species.
   Enlarge
   The Avon Gorge, home to several unique plant species.

   Bristol is in a limestone area, which forms to the Mendip Hills to the
   south and the Cotswolds to the north east. The rivers Avon and Frome
   cut through this limestone to the underlying clays, creating Bristol's
   characteristic hilly lansdscape. The Avon flows from Bath in the east,
   through flood plains and areas which were marshy before the growth of
   the city. To the west the Avon has cut through the limestone to form
   the Avon Gorge, partly aided by glacial meltwater after the last ice
   age. The gorge aided in the protection of Bristol Harbour, and has been
   quarried for stone to build the city. The land surrounding the gorge
   has been protected from development, as The Downs and Leigh Woods. The
   gorge and estuary of the Avon form the county's boundary with North
   Somerset, and the river flows into the Bristol Channel at Avonmouth at
   the mouth of the River Severn. There is another gorge in the city, in
   the Blaise Castle estate to the north.

   Situated in the south of the country, Bristol is one of the warmest
   cities in the UK, with a mean annual temperature of 10.2-12° C. It is
   also amongst the sunniest, with 1541-1885 hours sunshine per year. The
   city is partially sheltered by Exmoor and the Mendip Hills, but exposed
   from the Bristol Channel, and annual rainfall is similar to the
   national average, at 741-1060 mm.

Education

   The University of Bristol's Wills Memorial Building - a familiar
   landmark at the top of Park Street.
   Enlarge
   The University of Bristol's Wills Memorial Building - a familiar
   landmark at the top of Park Street.

   Bristol is home to two major institutions of higher education: the
   University of Bristol, a " redbrick" chartered in 1909, and the
   University of the West of England, formerly Bristol Polytechnic, which
   gained university status in 1992. The city also has two dedicated
   further education institutions, City of Bristol College and Filton
   College, and two theological colleges, Trinity College, Bristol &
   Wesley College, Bristol. The Create centre is home to many sustainable
   development projects and life-long learning schemes. The city has 129
   infants and primary schools, 17 secondary schools, and three city
   learning centres. There are also many independent schools of a high
   quality in the city, including Colston's Collegiate School, Clifton
   College, Badminton School, Bristol Cathedral School, Bristol Grammar
   School, Redland High School, Queen Elizabeth's Hospital - an all-boys
   school, the only one of its kind in the area and Red Maids' School, the
   oldest girls' school in England, founded in 1634 by John Whitson.

   In 2005 the Chancellor of the Exchequer recognised Bristol's strong
   ties to science and technology by naming it one of three "science
   cities", and promising funding for further development of science in
   the city, with a £300 million "Science Park" planned at Emerson's
   Green. As well as research at the two universities and Southmead
   Hospital, science education is important in the city, with At-Bristol,
   Bristol Zoo and Bristol Festival of Nature being prominent educational
   organisations. The city has a history of scientific achievement,
   including Sir Humphry Davy, the 19th century scientist who worked in
   Hotwells and discovered laughing gas. Bishopston has given the world
   two Nobel Prize winning physicists: Paul Dirac for crucial
   contributions to quantum mechanics in 1933, and Cecil Frank Powell, for
   a photographic method of studying nuclear processes and associated
   discoveries in 1950. The city was birth place of Colin Pillinger,
   planetary scientist behind the Beagle 2 Mars lander project, and is
   home to Adam Hart-Davis, presenter of various science related
   television programmes, and the psychologists Susan Blackmore, Richard
   Gregory, and Derren Brown.

Transport

   Bristol International Airport, Lulsgate
   Enlarge
   Bristol International Airport, Lulsgate

   There are two principal railway stations in Bristol, Bristol Parkway
   and Bristol Temple Meads, and there are scheduled coach links to most
   major UK cities. The city is connected by road on an east-west axis
   from London to Wales by the M4 motorway, and on a north-southwest axis
   from Birmingham to Exeter by the M5 motorway. Also within the county is
   the M49 motorway, a shortcut between the M5 in the south and M4 Severn
   Crossing in the west. The M32 motorway is a spur from the M4 to the
   city centre. The city is also served by its own airport, Bristol
   International (BRS), at Lulsgate, which has recently seen substantial
   investments in its runway, terminal and other facilities.

   Public transport in the city consists largely of its bus network,
   provided by First Group. Buses in the city have been criticised for
   being unreliable and expensive, and in 2005 First were fined for delays
   and safety violations. Use of private cars in Bristol is high, and the
   city suffers from congestion problems, estimated to cost the economy
   £350 million per year. Since 2000 the city council has included a light
   rail system in its Local Transport Plan, but has so far been unable to
   fund the project. The city was offered European Union funding for the
   system, but the Department for Transport did not provide the required
   additional funding. As well as support for public transport, there are
   several road building schemes supported by the local council, including
   re-routing and improving the South Bristol Ring Road. The central part
   of the city has water-based transport, operated as the Bristol Ferry
   Boat, which provide both leisure and commuter services on the harbour.

   Bristol was never well served by suburban railways, though the Severn
   Beach Line to Avonmouth and Severn Beach survived the Beeching Axe and
   is still in operation. The Portishead Railway was closed to passengers
   under the Beeching Axe, but was relaid in 2000-2002 as far as the Royal
   Portbury Dock with a Strategic Rail Authority rail-freight grant. Plans
   to relay a further three miles of track to Portishead, a largely
   dormitory town with only one connecting road, have been discussed but
   there is insufficient funding to rebuild stations.

   Despite being hilly, Bristol is one of the prominent cycling cities of
   England, and is home to the national cycle campaigning group Sustrans.
   It has a number of urban cycle routes, as well as links to National
   Cycle Network routes to Bath and London, to Gloucester and Wales, and
   to the south-western peninsula of England. Cycling has grown rapidly in
   the city, at 1.64% between 1991 and 2001, and 21% between 2001 and
   2005.

Twin cities

   The west front of Bristol Cathedral
   Enlarge
   The west front of Bristol Cathedral

   Bristol was amongst the first cities to adopt the idea of town
   twinning. In 1947 it was twinned with Bordeaux and Hanover, the first
   post-war twinning of British and German cities. It is currently twinned
   with:
     * France Bordeaux, France, since 1947
     * Mozambique Beira, Mozambique, since 1990
     * People's Republic of China Guangzhou, China, since 2001
     * Germany Hanover, Germany, since 1947
     * Nicaragua Puerto Morazan, Nicaragua, since 1989
     * Portugal Porto, Portugal, since 1984
     * Georgia (country) Tbilisi, Georgia, since 1988

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