Blackpool|53.8141|-3.0535|Blackpool is a seaside town in
Lancashire, England.|

Blackpool

Blackpool is a seaside town in Lancashire, England. Lying along the coast of the Irish Sea, it has a population of 142,900, making it the largest settlement in Lancashire and the fourth largest in North West England.

Blackpool rose to prominence as a major centre of tourism during the 19th century, particularly for the inhabitants of northern mill towns.

Governance

Though the Blackpool Urban Area extends beyond the statutory boundaries of Blackpool to encompass Fleetwood, Cleveleys, Thornton, Poulton-le-Fylde and Lytham St Anne's, Blackpool remains administratively separate.

Between 1894 and 1974, Blackpool formed a county borough independent of the administrative county of Lancashire. With the passage of the Local Government Act 1972, Blackpool's county borough status was abolished and it was made part of the shire county of Lancashire. On April 1, 1998, however, Blackpool was made a unitary authority and re-formed as an autonomous local government unit. It remains part of Lancashire for ceremonial purposes however.

Etymology

Blackpool is believed to get its name from a long-gone drainage channel which ran over a peat bog. This stream may be the Spen Dyke indicated on the 1847 edition of the OS. The water which ran into the sea at Blackpool was black from the peat and as the History section below indicates, the local dialect for stream was pul or poole, hence Black Poole. Locally people originating from Blackpool are called "Sand Grown" or "Sandgrown'uns".
Bispham|53.8497|-3.0528|Bispham is a village roughly one-and-a-half
miles north of Blackpool town centre on
the Fylde coast|

Bispham

Bispham is a village roughly one-and-a-half miles north of Blackpool town centre on the Fylde coast in the county of Lancashire, England.

Geography and administration

The village is part of the borough of Blackpool. To the south of Bispham is North Shore and Layton, to the east is Carleton and to the north is Norbreck and Thornton Cleveleys and to the west, the Irish sea. The area is mostly urban. Bispham is currently in the Blackpool North and Fleetwood parliamentary constituency. However at the next general election it will be part of the newly created Blackpool North and Cleveleys constituency. The village is also in the North West England European parliament constituency. Bispham has three electoral wards, Bispham, Greenlands and Ingthorpe.

Local attractions and amenities

The village has a few attractions, with the tram station and the highest cliffs on the both the Fylde coast and the North West Coast. There are a number of hotels and guest houses mostly around the seaward end of Red Bank Road and on Queens Promenade. The Red Lion pub also houses a Premier Travel Inn.

Bispham has five of the fourteen Lancashire County Council designated Biological Heritage Sites (BHS) located in Blackpool, including Kincraig Lake Ecological Reserve which is located on Kincraig Road, with Kincraig lake and a wild fowl population, from which Kincraig Primary School takes its school crest.


Fleetwood|53.92405|-3.0085|Fleetwood is a town within the
Wyre district of Lancashire, England|

Fleetwood

Fleetwood is a town within the Wyre district of Lancashire, England, lying at the northwest corner of the Fylde. It has a population of 26,840 people as of the 2001 Census. It forms part of the Greater Blackpool conurbation. The town was the first planned community of the Victorian era. For most of the twentieth century, Fleetwood was a prominent deep-sea fishing port, but, since the 1970s, the fishing industry has declined precipitously and the town has undergone economic difficulties. Fleetwood is also a seaside resort, serving as a quiet contrast to nearby Blackpool.

Location and Geography

Fleetwood is located on the Fylde peninsula, eight miles (13 km) north of Blackpool, on the western side of the mouth of the River Wyre. The town itself is on a peninsula, almost two miles (3 km) wide, bounded to the west by the Irish Sea, to the north by Morecambe Bay, and to the east by the River Wyre. Access to Fleetwood is thus restricted, and for many years there were only two roads into and out of the town. A large sandbank, the North Wharf, extends some two and a quarter miles north into Morecambe Bay, and is exposed at low tide. The river channel forms the eastern boundary of the bank, and, together with the larger Bernard Wharf on the other side of the river, this makes navigation of the river difficult. Conversely, the port is highly sheltered from the prevailing westerly winds.
Poulton-le-Fylde|53.85110|-2.98725|Poulton-le-Fylde is a town within the
Wyre borough of Lancashire, England|

Poulton-le-Fylde

Poulton-le-Fylde (commonly shortened by locals to just Poulton) is a town within the Wyre borough of Lancashire, England. The town has a population of 19,480 as of 2001 and occupies an area of 7.79 kmē, for a population density of 2500 people/kmē. It is situated about 5 kilometres to the northeast of Blackpool town and the Irish Sea coast.

The town gained its name from the Wyre estuary, which lies less than 2 kilometres to the north-east at Skippool. The name Poulton was created by combining the Old English words Pol, for pool or creek, and Tun, meaning a farmstead or enclosure. Thus the name signifies "settlement by the pool". In 1842 the suffix 'le-Fylde' was added to distinguish the village from Poulton-le-Sands, a community since renamed to Morecambe. The suffix comes from the Fylde peninsula, although the town is not in the modern day local government area of Fylde, which covers only the southern part of that peninsula.

By 2009, the town of Poulton-le-Fylde is expected to join the Wyre and Preston North constituency of the UK Parliament.


Kirkham|53.7828|-2.8767|Kirkham is a town in the Fylde
district of Lancashire, England|

Kirkham

Kirkham, or as it once was known, Kirkam-in-Amounderness is a town in the Fylde district of Lancashire, England, midway between Blackpool and Preston (11 miles west of Preston). It owes its existence to Carr Hill upon which it was built and which was the location of a Roman fort.

The town is pre-Roman in its origin with a name originating from the Danish word kirk (church) and -ham (Saxon for settlement).It appears in the Domesday Book of 1086 under the name of Chicheham and is described as lying on the Roman road between Ribchester (Bremetennacum) and the River Wyre. The town's market has one of the oldest charters in the United Kingdom, having been granted in 1269–70 by King Henry III. The Church of England parish church is St Michael's. There is also a Roman Catholic church - St John The Evangelist, but known locally as "The Willows" - located on Ribby Road and a United Reformed Church located on Poulton Street.

Kirkham lies in the centre of a relatively rich agricultural area. By the mid 18th century, however, the manufacture of sail-cloth and the flax-weaving industry had become well established in the town. By 1876 there were several factories employing almost 1,000 workers in the cotton and other industries and by the end of the century the town had grown considerably in importance.

Kirkham station was opened in 1844, four years after the Preston and Wyre Railway and Harbour Company had opened its line to Fleetwood. It now also serves the adjacent town of Wesham.