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Wigan, the town, has a population of about 81k. However Wigan, the metropolitan borough, has a population of about 306k (which includes the towns of Wigan, Leigh, Orrell, etc).
Isn't Greater Sydney just Sydney? Whereas Greater Manchester is a county and Manchester is a city? There's no actual definition of Greater Sydney that I can find, whereas Greater Manchester is an actual places with boundaries.
Not any more they folded halfway through last year
As Wellsy says, the 'town' proper does only have around 90k, in the same way the 'City of Sydney' only has around 200k. The borough of Wigan, which is basically the surrounding metropolitan area, has around 300k, and people from there would identify to outsiders as being from Wigan. Somewhere like Orrell is only 3 miles from Wigan town centre, the people from there are definitely from Wigan, but they wouldn't have been counted on population figures for Wigan in the past because traditionally it's not part of the 'town'. Because England is so old, places weren't ever properly incorporated into cities, so the whole thing is a bit messed up and it's all a bit unclear where towns begin and end. The place that I would describe as Wigan is the borough, trying to narrow things down to the traditional town boundaries seems pedantic and pointless to me, and also doesn't give an accurate picture. It's just tradition I guess. That's why you can't find a decent list of UK cities by population on Wikipedia. If you came to Wigan, you would find it's a pretty big place with quite a large population, rather than just an isolated town of 90k like you would find in rural Queensland or somewhere.
That's why it's so difficult to determine the actual population of places. Although St Helens is a borough in its own right. I reckon using boroughs is still the most accurate way, alright you end up with anomalies such as Leigh being part of Wigan but at least it gives a clearer indication of the size of places. It just comes down to local geography, I bet a lot of people from Newton would describe themselves as being from St Helens if they met someone from outside of the region and I certainly think of it as part of St Helens even though it's technically not.
I believe thats what will happen and there are plans to create a super Manchester region which will funnily enough include Warrington and Macclesfield! hehe
It doesn't really exist?!
I have a few friends from Oldham who class themselves as Manchester. Greater Manchester is not Manchester, but you could say you are from Manchester as an abbreviation of Greater Manchester very easily.
Are you trying to tell me there are no Wigan supporters in Leigh? If so, you're speaking rubbish. Just because you're from Leigh doesn't mean you automatically have to support Leigh. You don't pop out with a Centurions shirt on at birth. People can have links to wherever they like in whichever way they feel. There are tonnes of people in Leigh that class themselves as from Wigan. It's only because of the RL rivalry that certain people won't class themselves as it.
The thread isn't about Dream Super Leagues in the slightest. That's called "thread drift" and it deflects from the actual topic discussion. It's just good forum practice, fella.
The City of Sydney situation is slightly different. That's more akin to London and the City of London. London is a city as well, and the City of London is a city within London (itself a city). Greater Manchester is not a city. So to say Salford is a part of Manchester is wrong, but to say (for example) Fulham is a part of London is correct (despite not being a part of the City of London), and Penrith is a part of Sydney. If Greater Manchester was just called "Manchester" and had city status in the same way that London and Sydney do (leaving the original City of Manchester an area of Manchester) then it would be correct to say Salford was a part of Manchester.
Just read something about Greater Manchester getting "city region status" in 2009. Not quite sure what that means, whether they are actually a city or not (apparently Bolton and Blackpool are applying to become cities in 2012 as well as part of the Queen's jubilee).
I was referring to Wigan rather than Manchester in the post you quoted, although Wigan's not a city so I'm not sure if it was the best example, I was just trying to illustrate the 'town within a town' thing. It's extremely complicated either way.
