Jump to content

List of UK Counties


Deceangi

Recommended Posts

The problem here is everyone has their own view of what is and is not a County, you have to use the present day legislated list, this is and always will be the only way.

But I'm sure that Groundspeak will not be keen on updating there lists each time the UK government decides to change this. Surely it would be better to agree on a historic list of some sort which is fixed.

 

As no physical boundary's will be used, any future revisions by the English or Scottish Governments [ I don't believe the Welsh Assembly has been devolved this power yet] would not affect the list. As stated the list is to solely provide a extra level of filtering when running a PQ or cache search.

 

To insure the maximum amount of opinions can be obtained, I've posted the following to all the UK forums

 

Would every UK Cacher please visit This Topic on Groundspeaks UK Forum in particular post 37. And express a preference on the 2 options

 

Deceangi UK Reviewer Geocaching.com

 

With a slightly edited version to catch any NI cachers who solely visit the Ireland forum. We'll leave open the collection of opinions until Noon Saturday 16th Febuary

Link to comment

 

As no physical boundary's will be used, any future revisions by the English or Scottish Governments [ I don't believe the Welsh Assembly has been devolved this power yet] would not affect the list. As stated the list is to solely provide a extra level of filtering when running a PQ or cache search.

 

I expect I am being stupid here, but with no boundaries, how does the filter work?

Link to comment

 

As no physical boundary's will be used, any future revisions by the English or Scottish Governments [ I don't believe the Welsh Assembly has been devolved this power yet] would not affect the list. As stated the list is to solely provide a extra level of filtering when running a PQ or cache search.

 

I expect I am being stupid here, but with no boundaries, how does the filter work?

 

When setting the cache, people select the county from a drop down list. The county selected is stored with the cache details.

 

When searching, the searchers may select a county (or several? not clear) from a drop down list. If they do, the list of caches returned is filtered to match the selected county(ies).

Link to comment

 

Awwww! What about Lancashire police? Which authority manages them? :):)

Blackburn

City of Lacaster

City of Preston

Hynburn

Pendle

Ribble Valley

Blackpool

Wyre

Burnley

 

I could carry on, but all are within the County of Lancashire and are serviced by the Lancashire Police and Fire Services. And managed by Lancashire County Council

Link to comment

As many have said, neither is perfect - my address is in Middlesex, not London, yet Middlesex is not on either list...

 

However, since having a list is better than the current situation, I'll go with Rutsons list. It will still be almost acceptable in a few years time when the other one has become completely unacceptable.

 

Bob Aldridge

Link to comment

My point was that there is a list, it is provided in the 1972 Act which created the present Counties, these boundaries were not removed or altered by the 2000 0r 2003 acts, so the boundaries are as 1973.

 

And therein lies the confuision - There is the present list (i.e. the adminstrative counties with loads of unitary authorities) and the ceremonial counties list.

 

Rutson's list seems to be the ceremonial list, as defined in the Lieutenancies Act 1997.

 

I understood you to be advocating using the current administrative counties, which could be changed any time.

 

So it appears we actually agree! :)

Link to comment

A vote for Mr Rutson from my camp....

 

At least Wirral will be recognised - better than one of the alternatives - where Merseyside was not on the map, and Cheshire wouldn't have us!!!

 

I'll be glad of the ability to select counties - I have the same problem as Deci...

 

I live on a penninsula and as I've done all bar one of the caches here, it tells me my nearest cache is 4.6 miles away.

 

The only trouble is that that's as the crow flies... In order to get to that cache, I have to drive for around 30 minutes!

On the other side of the penninsula it's a good 30 mile drive to the nearest cache - again - across the water... but then I do get to see the lovely Deci when I make the pilgrimage to Welsh Wales!!!

Edited by HazelS
Link to comment

I used to live in Bucks but then was moved to Berks by the nice government people (although before there it was Middx!). Then I moved to Beds, but it used to be in Bucks too!

 

Ian's list is the one I usually go by.

 

out of interest, when we create caches, will we then be given the option of picking the county? I'm just intrigued because I live so close to the Bucks/Herts/Beds border that sometimes it's difficult. For instance, a nice fella called "The Hornet" placed a cache in one end of a park, Andybug and Ladybird put one at the other end. There's barely 0.4 between them (caches in Question are "Down in the Park" and "Greensand Ridge"). I'm not sure even the most accurate map will decide where Greensand Ridge is - it appears to straddle the border!

Link to comment

Including counties for caches in NI which are listed in the UK would help to remove them from searches for caches by those in Scotland. NI is unique in that caches there may be listed as being either in the UK or Ireland. Ideally the same counties would be added to the Ireland Counties list as well. Until such time as GC renames the area Ireland-RoI & NI or similar, to take into account the uniqueness of the area.

OT, but, sorry, that makes no sense at all. Northern Ireland, whether some of its population like it or not, is in the UK. All caches in NI should be listed in the UK. As things are now, anyone wanting a complete list of NI caches has to look in both Ireland and UK.

 

As a general consensus does not seem reachable :) I thought that I'd put the following 2 lists forward and ask every one to indicate a preference [please remember you considering Administration areas only for filtering purposes, and not physical boundaries]

By definition, a discussion about counties can't be about physical boundaries. Counties, and the entities which have replaced them, are political not physical. Sure, the political boundaries often follow physical features - mostly rivers - but that doesn't change the principle.

 

Option One: Administration Geography of the UK click on Open Top 2 Levels

I can't read that. Clicking the button returns an object error.

 

Option Two: Rutsons list

"Rutson's list" is merely the ceremonial counties list referred to much further up the thread. It's adequate, but Bristol??? I can't say I agree with splitting up Yorkshire either but I guess history is against me on that one :).

 

As Phillimore Clan point out, boundaries will move. How will the caches be kept correct? The answer is they won't, which means that the data will become more and more incorrect over time. If the requirement - if indeed there is a requirement: I'm still not sure what it is we're trying to fix - is to make PQs work better for areas then the best solution is for PQs to work with polygons rather than circles. This provides a lower level of granularity than countries, is much more flexible, and is self-maintaining as it works from the cache coords.

Link to comment

Noooo! Not another county list... That means we will have to go driving all around the country again :) The worrying thing is that there are a lot more Scottish counties than on the GCUK list, but we like going to Scotland :)

 

Now we realise this is just for searching but there are a few stats sites that list cache finds by county. GCUK is one and NotAboutTheNumbers is another. These seem to near enough concer; going to our profile page will bring up a list of all the UK counties according to the latter - 76 in total. The former uses a polygon filter and the latter asks people which county a new cache is in once it appears on their database. It would be nice if there was some agreement if only so people who want to get a coloured county on their map or another number in the GCUK table can be confident when they search. I guess whichever list is finalised could be used by these sites also given time or it could even be listed by GC.

 

If we only have the choice of the two given then Rutson's list would seem the more reasonable from what I have read but I cannot get the other list while at work. Ultimately as long as people can recognise all the counties and none are too big or too small (so for example Yorkshire as a whole would be too large but Rutland may be a bit on the small side) then it does not really matter,

 

Helen

Edited by T-girls
Link to comment

Rutsons list please, with some additions as this is a list to help us geographically (and as we have Eire included).

 

1. Scilly Isles

2. Isle of Mann

3. Channel Islands

4. Orkney

5. Shetland

 

Philip

IOM and CI are already separate countries, available in the country drop-down lists in PQs and cache listings.

 

Your post neatly makes the point: the requirement - someone do please correct me - is for meaningful physical areas. Counties don't achieve that, except coincidentally.

Link to comment

"Rutson's list" is merely the ceremonial counties list referred to much further up the thread. It's adequate, but Bristol??? I can't say I agree with splitting up Yorkshire either but I guess history is against me on that one :).

It's similar: how about this for a better list though.

 

As Phillimore Clan point out, boundaries will move. How will the caches be kept correct?

Boundaries don't matter a great deal for the purpose of this exercise. As I said above, as a local you'll have a good idea that your cache is in Berkshire so you can select "Berkshire" from the list. Sometimes it's going to be debatable whether the cache really IS in Berkshire, but no doubt the cache description can be changed if enough complaints are received by the cache owner.

Link to comment

Table version here that doesnt require Javascript.

Thanks, Barry, though JS isn't the problem (at least, it's not anywhere else).

 

Actually, I (alone :)) like your list. Because it uses the correct political subdivisions then it's capable of defining the area of the cache much more precisely. Unfortunately Groundspeak doesn't have enough data fields to accommodate that system, and in any case I'm not sure that it's sufficiently meaningful to those from outside the area. And I still think what we're really asking for are physical boundaries not political ones :).

Link to comment

Rutsons list please, with some additions as this is a list to help us geographically (and as we have Eire included).

 

1. Scilly Isles

2. Isle of Mann

3. Channel Islands

4. Orkney

5. Shetland

 

Philip

IOM and CI are already separate countries, available in the country drop-down lists in PQs and cache listings.

True: I propose the Ceremonial Counties Listwith the addition of the Scilly Isles (plus Anglesey?), and removal of Channel Isles (Orkney and Shetland are already in).

 

Your post neatly makes the point: the requirement - someone do please correct me - is for meaningful physical areas. Counties don't achieve that, except coincidentally.

You're right, it's arbitrary: but there's not really another sensible way of splitting the country up at this scale and this list will serve a purpose in several cases (the Isle of Wight is an obvious example).

Edited by Happy Humphrey
Link to comment

 

As a general consensus does not seem reachable :) I thought that I'd put the following 2 lists forward and ask every one to indicate a preference [please remember you considering Administration areas only for filtering purposes, and not physical boundaries]

 

Option One: Administration Geography of the UK click on Open Top 2 Levels

 

Option Two: Rutsons list

 

 

Of those two, Rutson's list, every time. The alternative has far too many unitary authorities, which in most cases, to most people, are not counties. Many of them aren't even cities.

 

What the man said - Rutsons list for me.

Link to comment

It's similar: how about this for a better list though.

Ah, much more interesting :).

 

As Phillimore Clan point out, boundaries will move. How will the caches be kept correct?

Boundaries don't matter a great deal for the purpose of this exercise. As I said above, as a local you'll have a good idea that your cache is in Berkshire so you can select "Berkshire" from the list. Sometimes it's going to be debatable whether the cache really IS in Berkshire, but no doubt the cache description can be changed if enough complaints are received by the cache owner.

You miss the point. Of course boundaries matter - that's what defines which county the cache is in :). Setting the county at the time of cache placement is the easy bit. What happens when the boundary moves? What happens when the "county" is renamed? What happens when the cache is moved to the other side of the boundary?

 

All data, just like caches, requires maintenance.

Link to comment

As this is complicated: how about the following (which is basically the Ceremonial Counties list with a few adjustments, similar to the Rutson List);

 

Aberdeenshire

Anglesey

Angus

Argyll and Bute

Ayrshire and Arran

Banffshire

Bedfordshire

Belfast

Berkshire

Berwickshire

Buckinghamshire

Caithness

Cambridgeshire

Cheshire

City of Aberdeen

City of Bristol

City of Dundee

City of Edinburgh

City of Glasgow

City of London

Clackmannanshire

Clwyd

Cornwall

County Antrim

County Armgh

County Derry

County Down

County Fermanagh

County Tyrone

Cumbria

Derbyshire

Devon

Dorset

Dumfries

Dunbartonshire

Durham

Dyfed

East Lothian

East Riding of Yorkshire

East Sussex

Essex

Fife

Gloucestershire

Greater London

Greater Manchester

Gwent

Gwynedd

Hampshire

Herefordshire

Hertfordshire

Inverness

Isle of Wight

Isles of Scilly

Kent

Kincardineshire

Lanarkshire

Lancashire

Leicestershire

Lincolnshire

Londonderry / Derry

Merseyside

Mid Glamorgan

Midlothian

Moray

Nairn

Norfolk

North Yorkshire

Northamptonshire

Northumberland

Nottinghamshire

Orkney

Oxfordshire

Perth and Kinross

Powys

Renfrewshire

Ross and Cromarty

Roxburgh, Ettrick and Lauderdale

Rutland

Shetland

Shropshire

Somerset

South Glamorgan

South Yorkshire

Staffordshire

Stirling and Falkirk

Suffolk

Surrey

Sutherland

The Stewartry of Kirkcudbright

Tweeddale

Tyne and Wear

Warwickshire

West Glamorgan

West Lothian

West Midlands

West Sussex

West Yorkshire

Western Isles

Wigton

Wiltshire

Worcestershire

Link to comment

Just to clarify a couple of points. the counties list will only form a drop down list which will add the chosen one to the country. So any search will filter out all except that chosen ie: UK-Cheshire will only show caches which the owner has designated to be in Cheshire. No physical boundary's will be used, just like now it's possible to submit a cache as being in the UK but the coordinates place it in Ghana [and yes I have seen this happen]. UK and County are just key words for the system to search for, adding the UK ones will just add a level of filtering to searches based on keyword alone. Unless you do a specific search based on coordinates, GC searches are key word based for the most part.

 

OT, but, sorry, that makes no sense at all. Northern Ireland, whether some of its population like it or not, is in the UK. All caches in NI should be listed in the UK. As things are now, anyone wanting a complete list of NI caches has to look in both Ireland and UK.

 

What would make complete sense is for Ireland to indicate that it covers both RoI & NI. You have to remember the Country's used by GC are for Administration purposes only [The UN lists 100+ country's, GC 200+]. Ireland when the system was set up was intended to cover the whole of the Island [both RoI & NI] but due to vocal complaints by a section of the caching community in NI, they agreed to allow the owner to chose between either country.

 

What does not make sense is for Scottish cachers to end up with caches in NI in searches, and cachers who live in RoI not to have caches in NI picked up in searches [travelling down some roads on the border and you can cross into both RoI and NI 3 or 4 times in less than a mile]

Link to comment

Someone mentioned Lieutenancies Act 1997, but this only covers 14 counties, it ius in no way a definitive list

 

"The counties in England for the purposes of this Act are—

( a ) Greater London (excluding the City of London);

( b ) the areas which are to be regarded as counties for those purposes by virtue of paragraph 3; and

( c ) any other areas in England which are counties for the purposes of the [1972. c. 70.] Local Government Act 1972. "

 

Link to the act

 

The 1972 list formed the administrative counties such as North Yorks, Cumbria, Humberside, Teesside, but the 1997 act then replaced certain 'new' and put them into ceremonial counties which are loosely based on the 1972 adminstrative counties. Examples are Teeside being split between Durham & North Yorks, Humberside being split between East Riding and Lincolnshire.

 

Therefore it covers the 1972 counties and subesequent amendments to arrive at the ceremonial list, on which Rutson's list is based.

 

Maybe we should use:

Strathclyde, Northumberland, Danish Mercia, English Mercia, Kingdom of Guthrum, Wessex and its dependencies, Wales and Scotland? See here

Cue loads of marauding Scots claiming Strathclyde as Scottish. Pah.

 

Now I shall stop being silly/argumentative (depends on your point of view I guess) and get back to work. :)

Link to comment

You know, I don't think we actually deserve counties.

:)

 

You know, this is much more fun than work! I'm supposed to be checking a document, and its really tedious. That might be why I'm being overly picky - it takes a certain mindset I to do what I'm doing.

 

We're not even allow crayons here. :)

 

Now stop distracting me. :)

Link to comment

OK. We will choose our County when submitting new caches but what about all the current caches. Will it be up to the owners to edit the details?

 

Unless every cache is correctly classified the County search will never be very accurate, or am I missing something here?

Unless every cache is correctly classified the County search will never be very accurate work :)

Link to comment

I'm seeing various options for Derry / Londonderry - can I suggest that we resolve that issue first :)

 

Sorry, couldn't resist....

 

It strikes me that if the areas are too granular then people will be doing searches for countries instead in order to get a wide enough local. This is to aid, not be your local search.

Link to comment

Ohhhhhh heck, it's all going complicated again.

 

interestedcat.jpg

 

You know, I don't think we actually deserve counties.

Hey, is that Tiddles :) ?

 

Of the two choices I'd say it has to be Rutsons list. Mind you I'm not sure how useful this is going to be with 20,000 odd caches already in existence that won't have this data attached!

Link to comment
I'm seeing various options for Derry / Londonderry - can I suggest that we resolve that issue first :)

 

Sorry, couldn't resist....

 

It strikes me that if the areas are too granular then people will be doing searches for countries instead in order to get a wide enough local. This is to aid, not be your local search.

 

 

canoworms.jpg

it's Derry :)

Link to comment

Time to throw in an alternative suggestion.

 

If we really can't decide on a definitive list, how about we opt for the top level of Postal Code districts instead.

 

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Category:Post..._United_Kingdom

 

That wouldn't work, who knows the postcode apart from those who live there?

 

e.g. the DN postcode would include places on the lincolnshire east coast, although DN (Doncaster) is in Yorkshire (north I think?)

Link to comment

Time to throw in an alternative suggestion.

 

If we really can't decide on a definitive list, how about we opt for the top level of Postal Code districts instead.

 

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Category:Post..._United_Kingdom

 

That wouldn't work, who knows the postcode apart from those who live there?

 

e.g. the DN postcode would include places on the lincolnshire east coast, although DN (Doncaster) is in Yorkshire (north I think?)

 

And I'm sure that people in Aylesbury and High Wycombe (very much Bucks) don't want to be in Hemel Hempstead, Hertfordshire!

Link to comment

OK. We will choose our County when submitting new caches but what about all the current caches. Will it be up to the owners to edit the details?

 

Unless every cache is correctly classified the County search will never be very accurate, or am I missing something here?

 

It will be up to the owners to edit their caches once implemented, not a imposable task to get the majority done in 12-18 months, going from the experience of other country's. I'm sure between the 3(4) of us [Reviewers] , we can knock up a template to be used for owners who haven't added the county, locals could also post a note requesting the owner adds the county.

Link to comment

Couple of points to remember.

 

No physical boundary's will be used by GC, the list is to provide subdivision of the UK to allow extra filtering in PQ's and cache searches. which would come in extremly handy for those near a large natural barrier [for instance I live on the North Wales coast, if I do a search from home within 10 miles I get caches on the Wirral. I can stand on the beach and wave to people at some of the cache sites, but to get to them means a 30+mile journey one way]

 

Including counties for caches in NI which are listed in the UK would help to remove them from searches for caches by those in Scotland. NI is unique in that caches there may be listed as being either in the UK or Ireland. Ideally the same counties would be added to the Ireland Counties list as well. Until such time as GC renames the area Ireland-RoI & NI or similar, to take into account the uniqueness of the area.

 

Also please remember GC will only implement the counties list if we provide them with one, they will not pick a single list from a multiple choice.

As a general consensus does not seem reachable :) I thought that I'd put the following 2 lists forward and ask every one to indicate a preference [please remember you considering Administration areas only for filtering purposes, and not physical boundaries]

 

Option One: Administration Geography of the UK click on Open Top 2 Levels

 

Option Two: Rutsons list

 

And then come to a final decision with Eckington and Lactodorum, which will then be passed on to GC as the definitive counties list. And yes I'm aware we're not going to please everyone, but as stated the aim is to provide more filtering in PQ's and cache searches.

 

And if I seem to be rushing the issue, it's because GC have recently implemented counties for several other European country's, and I'd like to see this happen for the UK. The Mega is 6 months away, by the time we'd tallied up all votes we'd be looking at least 8 months from now before we could present the results to GC. By which time we could be looking at a code freeze as GC prepares to role out V2 (Phoenix) of the site [if it hasn't already been done]. Meaning we'd have no idea what sort of wait we would be looking at for implementation.

 

Does the above highlighted piece mean if we dont choose, nothing changes, and nobody has to argue anymore.

Sorted

Link to comment

Join the conversation

You can post now and register later. If you have an account, sign in now to post with your account.
Note: Your post will require moderator approval before it will be visible.

Guest
Reply to this topic...

×   Pasted as rich text.   Paste as plain text instead

  Only 75 emoji are allowed.

×   Your link has been automatically embedded.   Display as a link instead

×   Your previous content has been restored.   Clear editor

×   You cannot paste images directly. Upload or insert images from URL.

Loading...
×
×
  • Create New...