Worcester in the West Midlands

Saturday, 17 October 2015 - 01:00 pm (CET/MEZ) Berlin | Author/Destination:
Category/Kategorie: General
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The Guildhall in High Street © Richard Nicholls/cc-by-sa-3.0

The Guildhall in High Street © Richard Nicholls/cc-by-sa-3.0

Worcester is a city and the county town of Worcestershire in the West Midlands of England. Worcester is situated some 17 miles (27 km) southwest of the southern suburbs of Birmingham and 23 miles (37 km) north of Gloucester, and has an approximate population of 100,000 people.

The River Severn flanks the western side of the city centre, overlooked by the 12th-century Worcester Cathedral. The site of the final battle of the Civil War, Worcester was where Oliver Cromwell‘s New Model Army defeated King Charles II‘s Cavaliers, cementing the English Interregnum, the eleven-year period during which England and Wales became a republic. Worcester was the home of Royal Worcester Porcelain and, for much of his life, the composer Sir Edward Elgar. It houses the Lea & Perrins factory where the traditional Worcestershire Sauce is made, and is home to one of the UK’s fastest-growing universities, the University of Worcester.

The Worcester Porcelain Museum © geograph.org.uk - Paul Shreeve/cc-by-sa-2.0 Tudor Buildings in Friar Street © Russ Hamer/cc-by-sa-3.0 Plaque at Lea & Perrins factory © Rept0n1x/cc-by-sa-3.0 Basin and canal at Diglis © geograph.org.uk - Andrew Darge/cc-by-sa-2.0 Worcester Cathedral, seen from Fort Royal Hill © geograph.org.uk - Philip Halling/cc-by-sa-2.0 The Guildhall in High Street © Richard Nicholls/cc-by-sa-3.0
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Worcester Cathedral, seen from Fort Royal Hill © geograph.org.uk - Philip Halling/cc-by-sa-2.0
In 1882 Worcester hosted the Worcestershire Exhibition, inspired by the Great Exhibition in London.There were sections for exhibits of fine arts (over 600 paintings), historical manuscripts and industrial items. The number of visitors is recorded as 222,807. Some of the profit from the exhibition was used to build the Victoria Institute in Foregate Street, Worcester. This was opened on 1 October 1896 and now houses the library and museum. In the 1950s and 1960s large areas of the medieval centre of Worcester were demolished and rebuilt as a result of decisions by town planners. This was condemned by many such as Nikolaus Pevsner who described it as a “totally incomprehensible… act of self-mutilation”. There is still a significant area of medieval Worcester remaining, but it is a small fraction of what was present before the redevelopments. There are three main parks in Worcester, Cripplegate Park, Gheluvelt Park and Fort Royal Park, the latter being on one of the battles sites of the English Civil War. In addition, there is a large open area known as Pitchcroft to the North of the city centre on the east bank of the River Severn, which, apart from those days when it is being used for horse racing, is a public space.

Worcester’s main shopping centre is the High Street, home to the stores of a number of major retail chains. Part of the High Street was modernised in 2005 amid much controversy. Many of the issues focussed on the felling of old trees, the duration of the works (caused by the weather and an archaeological find) and the removal of flagstones outside the city’s 18th-century Guildhall. The other main thoroughfares are The Shambles and Broad Street, while The Cross (and its immediate surrounding area) is the city’s financial centre and location of the majority of Worcester’s main bank branches. There are three main covered shopping centres in the city centre, these being CrownGate Shopping Centre, Cathedral Plaza and Reindeer Court. There is also an unenclosed shopping area located immediately east of the city centre called St. Martin’s Quarter.

Read more on Worcester City Council, VisitWorcestershire.org, Wikivoyage Worcester and Wikipedia Worcester. Learn more about the use of photos. To inform you about latest news most of the city, town or tourism websites offer a newsletter service and/or operate Facebook pages/Twitter accounts. In addition more and more destinations, tourist organizations and cultural institutions offer Apps for your Smart Phone or Tablet, to provide you with a mobile tourist guide (Smart Traveler App by U.S. Department of State - Weather report by weather.com - Global Passport Power Rank - Travel Risk Map - Democracy Index - GDP according to IMF, UN, and World Bank - Global Competitiveness Report - Corruption Perceptions Index - Press Freedom Index - World Justice Project - Rule of Law Index - UN Human Development Index - Global Peace Index - Travel & Tourism Competitiveness Index). If you have a suggestion, critique, review or comment to this blog entry, we are looking forward to receive your e-mail at comment@wingsch.net. Please name the headline of the blog post to which your e-mail refers to in the subject line.




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