Liverpool
The economy of Liverpool is beginning to recover from its long, post-World War II decline. Between 1995 and 2001 GVA per head grew at 6.3% annum. This compared with 5.8% for inner London and 5.7% for Bristol. The rate of job growth was 9.2% compared with a national average of 4.9% for the same period, 1998-2002. However, Liverpool is still comparatively poor; a 2001 report by CACI showed that Liverpool still had four of the ten poorest postcode districts in the country, and almost 30% of people aged 65 or over are without central heating.
Like the rest of the United Kingdom the city has seen a large growth in the service sector, both public and private. Government offices include parts of the National Health Service, Revenue and Customs and Home Office agencies such as the Criminal Records Bureau and the Identity and Passport Service, formerly the UK Passport Agency. Major private sector service industry concerns have also invested in Liverpool especially the financial services sector with Barclays, JPMorgan, Abbey National, Alliance & Leicester, Royal Bank of Scotland Group, HBOS and the Bank of Ireland either opening or expanding their sites, a number of major call centres have opened in recent years too and the professional advice sector. The activities of the port had, due to containerisation and reduced levels of commerce, left the region with a communications infrastructure that exceeded its requirements, however the port's cargo volumes have picked up significantly.
Growth in the areas of New Media has been helped by the existence of a relatively large computer game development community. Sony based one of only a handful of European PlayStation research and development centres in Wavertree, after buying out noted software publisher Psygnosis. According to a 2006 issue of industry magazine 'Edge' (issue 162), the first professional quality PlayStation software developer's kits were largely programmed by Sony's Liverpool 'studio'.
Tourism is a major factor in the economy and will be of increasing importance in the run up to the Liverpool's year as European Capital of Culture. This has led to a great increase in the provision of high quality services such as hotels, restaurants and clubs. The buildings of Liverpool not only attract tourists but also film makers, who regularly use Liverpool to double for cities around the world and making it the second most filmed city in the UK. Liverpool is also one of the few cities in the world where cruise liners can berth in the city centre, and from 2008 a significant number of ships will either set sail or call at Liverpool's cruise liner terminal, including the Grand Princess, and the QE2. Large naval ships coming in to dock also draw large crowds on sunny days. Liverpool and its boroughs have a large number of sandy beaches accessible by Merseyrail, which prove popular in the summer months.
Car-manufacturing also takes place in the city at the Halewood plant where the Jaguar X-Type and Land Rover Freelander models are assembled.
The owner of Liverpool's port and airport, Peel Holdings, announced on March 6, 2007 that is had plans to redevelop the city's northern dock area with a scheme entitled Liverpool Waters, which may see the creation of 17,000 jobs and £5.5bn invested in the vicinity over a 50 year period. This is coupled with a sister scheme on the other side of the River Mersey, called Wirral Waters.
Liverpool's main shopping area is Church Street , lying between Bold Street to the East and Lord Street to the West. The first phase of Liverpool One opened in May 2008 and is due to be complete by September 2008, and will be Europe's largest retail development when finished, being the redevelopment of a large part of the postcode area L1 - hence the name.
Landmarks
Liverpool waterfront, a UNESCO World Heritage site, as seen from the Wirral at night
Liverpool's history means that there are a considerable variety of architectural styles found there. Its role as a major port in the British Empire means that many of finest buildings in the city were built as headquarters for shipping firms and insurance companies, whilst the great wealth this afforded the city allowed the development of grand civic buildings, designed to allow the local administrators to 'run the city with pride'. There are over 2,500 listed buildings in Liverpool (of which 26 are Grade I listed and 85 are Grade II* listed) and only the UK capital London, has more.. It has been the beneficiary of high-minded public spirit since the late 18th century, largely with Dissenter impetus, resulting in more public sculpture than in any UK city aside from Westminster, more listed buildings than any city apart from London and, surprisingly, more Georgian houses than the city of Bath. Renowned architects are particularly well represented in Liverpool, including Peter Ellis, John Wood, the Elder of Bath (commissioned in 1749 to design the original Public Exchange which later became the Town Hall), Thomas 'Greek' Harrison, James Wyatt, Harvey Lonsdale Elmes, Philip Hardwick, Jesse Hartley (Dock engineer and architect of the Albert Dock and Stanley Dock), Charles Cockerell, Thomas Rickman, John Foster, Augustus Welby Northmore Pugin, J.J. Scholes, Sir Joseph Paxton, Sir Giles Gilbert Scott, J.K. Colling, J.A. Picton, George Edmund Street, John Loughborough Pearson, E.W. Pugin, E.R. Robson, Edmund Kirby, Sir Edwin Lutyens, Sir Frederick Gibberd, Alfred Waterhouse (who was born in Aigburth), W.D. Caroe, Leonard Stokes, Norman Shaw, James Francis Doyle, Walter Aubrey Thomas (architect of the iconic Royal Liver Building on the Liverpool waterfront), Gerald de Courcy Fraser, Charles Reilly and Herbert Rowse (architect of Martins Bank, Queensway Tunnel and India Buildings).
Waterfront and docks museums
In 2004, Liverpool's waterfront was declared as a UNESCO World Heritage site, reflecting the city's importance in the development of the world's trading system and dock technology.
The docks are central to Liverpool's history, with the best-known being Albert Dock: the first enclosed, non-combustible dock warehouse system in the world and is built in cast iron, brick and stone. It was designed by Jesse Hartley. Restored in the 1980s, the Albert Dock is the largest collection of Grade I listed buildings in Britain. Part of the old dock complex is now the home to the Merseyside Maritime Museum (an Anchor Point of ERIH, The European Route of Industrial Heritage), the International Slavery Museum and the Tate Liverpool. Other relics of the dock system include the Stanley Dock Tobacco Warehouse, which at the time of its construction in 1901, was the world's largest building in terms of area, and is still the world's largest brick-work building. Also the ill-fated passenger liner RMS Titanic was registered in Liverpool.
The Pier Head is the most famous image of Liverpool, the location of the Three Graces (a fairly recent phrase), three of Liverpool's most recognisable buildings. In ordefrom north to south they are:
- The Royal Liver Building, built in the early 1900s and surmounted by two bronze domes with a Liver Bird (the symbol of Liverpool) on each.
- The Cunard Building, the headquarters of the former Cunard shipping company.
- The Port of Liverpool Building, the home of the former Mersey Docks and Harbour Board which regulated the city's docks.
They were built on the site of the former George's Dock and Manchester Dock.
Kings Dock immediately south of the Albert Dock is the site of the Liverpool Echo Arena and BT Convention Centre which officially opened on the 12 January 2008.
In front of these buildings at the water's edge are the memorials to the men of the merchant navy who sailed out of the port during both World Wars. Memorials to the British mariners, Norwegian, Dutch and to the thousands of Chinese seamen who manned Britain's ships cluster together here. Perhaps most interesting is the Chinese memorial to the men forcibly deported from the city after World War Two and to the families they left behind.
Places of worship
Even more about Liverpool
Liverpool
Liverpool (pronunciation (help · info)) is a city and metropolitan borough of Merseyside, England, along the eastern side of the Mersey Estuary. It was founded as a borough in ...
Liverpool - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
Liverpool Football Club are an English professional football club based in Liverpool, Merseyside. Liverpool play in the Premier League, and are the most successful club in the ...
