Merseyside Merseyside Newburg, Wisconsin Category="Merseyside"Category="Metropolitan areas"

Merseyside
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Geography
Status:Ceremonial and Metropolitan county (no county council)
Region:North West England
Area:
- Total		Ranked 43rd
645 kmē
ONS code:2B
NUTS 2:UKD5
Demographics
Population:
- Total (2003 est.)
- Density		Ranked 9th
1,364,212
2,115
Ethnicity:97.1% White
Politics
Members of Parliament
Joe Benton, Ben Chapman, Claire Curtis-Thomas, Angela Eagle, Maria Eagle, Louise Ellman, Frank Field, Stephen Hesford, George Howarth, Jane Kennedy, Peter Kilfoyle, Edward O'Hara, John Pugh, Robert Wareing, David Watts, Shaun Woodward
Districts
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  1. Liverpool
  2. Sefton
  3. Knowsley
  4. St Helens
  5. Wirral

Merseyside is a metropolitan county, located in the North West of England. Merseyside is named after the River Mersey and comprises the Conurbation by the Mersey estuary centred upon Liverpool. The county was created in 1974 by the Local Government Act 1972.

Merseyside contains the metropolitan boroughs of Liverpool, Knowsley, Sefton, St Helens and the Wirral. The county is divided into two parts by the Mersey estuary, the Wirral is located on the west side of the estuary, upon the Wirral Peninsula and the rest of the county is located on the east side of the estuary. The northern part of Merseyside borders onto Lancashire to the north, Greater Manchester to the east, both parts border Cheshire to the south.

The two parts are linked by two road tunnels, a railway tunnel, and the famous Mersey Ferry.

Other districts that are part of the urban area (but not part of Merseyside) are Ellesmere Port and Neston, West Lancashire and Halton, this area is known informally as "Greater Merseyside".

It is traditional to express location within the Merseyside area by the pronoun on, thus "on Merseyside" as opposed to "in Merseyside" (after all, one would be "on the side of the Mersey" not "in" it). Current usage seems to be to make a distinction between the geographical "Merseyside" (The "Greater Merseyside" referred to above) for which "on" is appropriate and the county, for which "in" is used.

History and administration

Merseyside was created on 1 April 1974 from areas taken from the historic counties of Lancashire and Cheshire. Merseyside was a controversial creation, especially amongst the inhabitants of the Wirral, who had a strong sense of belonging to Cheshire and amongst those of St Helens and Southport who had an equally strong sense of Lancastrian identity. Originally Merseyside was intended to be much larger than it finally turned out to be, with the inclusion of Ellesmere Port and Neston and Ormskirk.

Between 1974 and 1986 the county had a two tier system of local government with the five boroughs sharing power with the Merseyside County Council. However in 1986 the government of Margaret Thatcher abolished the county council along with all other metropolitan county councils, and so its boroughs are now effectively unitary authorities. The easiest way of identifying which borough you are in is through observing the colour of bins. For example Liverpool has purple bins. Wool boroughs have other colours.

Merseyside however still exists legally, and as a ceremonial county.

Despite the abolition of the county council some local services are still run on a county-wide basis, now administered by joint-boards of the five metropolitan boroughs, these include the:

Towns and villages

See the List of places in Merseyside.

Places of interest

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Continued existence

Several organisations are still recognised using the old name of "Merseyside". The court service at Liverpool's Magistrate Court for example, registered the domain merseysidemcc.org.uk on 25th March 2005, more than a decade after the Merseyside Council was abolished.

External links

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