Groningen is the main municipality as well as the capital city of the eponymous province in the Netherlands. It is the largest city in the north of the Netherlands and has 231,037 inhabitants on a total area of 180.21 km2 (69.58 sq mi), and land area of 168.93 km2 (65.22 sq mi) with a population density of 1,367 per km2. It merged with Ten Boer and Haren municipalities on 1 January 2019. The Groningen-Assen metropolitan area has about half a million inhabitants. Groningen is an old city and was the regional power of the north of the Netherlands, a semi-independent city-state and member of the German Hanseatic League. Groningen is a university city, with students forming an estimated 25% of its total population.
Newcastle upon Tyne, often shortened to simply Newcastle, is the largest city in North East England. It forms the core of the Tyneside conurbation, the eighth most-populous urban area in the United Kingdom. Newcastle is one of the UK Core Cities, as well as part of the Eurocities network of European cities. It is situated on the northern bank of the River Tyne, approximately 8.5 mi (13.7 km) from the North Sea. Newcastle was part of the county of Northumberland until 1400, when it became a county of itself, a status it retained until it became a part of the metropolitan county of Tyne and Wear in 1974. The local authority is Newcastle City Council, a member of the North of Tyne Combined Authority. The regional nickname and dialect for people from Newcastle and the surrounding area is Geordie. In 2018, the city was declared as the best place to visit in the world by travel experts Rough Guides.
Tyne and Wear is a metropolitan and ceremonial county in North East England, situated around the mouths of the rivers Tyne and Wear. It came into existence in 1974 after the passage of the Local Government Act 1972. It consists of the five metropolitan districts of Newcastle upon Tyne, Gateshead, North Tyneside, South Tyneside and Sunderland. The county is bordered to the north by Northumberland, to the south by County Durham and to the east of the county lies the North Sea.
Gateshead is a large town in Tyne and Wear, England, on the southern bank of the River Tyne opposite Newcastle upon Tyne. Gateshead and Newcastle are joined by seven bridges across the Tyne, including the Gateshead Millennium Bridge. The town is known for its architecture, including the Sage Gateshead, the Angel of the North and the Baltic Centre for Contemporary Art. Residents of Gateshead, like the rest of Tyneside, are usually referred to as Geordies. Gateshead's town population in 2011 was 120,046.
The Gateshead Millennium Bridge is a pedestrian and cyclist tilt bridge spanning the River Tyne between the Gateshead arts quarter on the south bank and the Quayside of Newcastle upon Tyne on the north bank. Opened for public use in 2001, the award-winning structure was conceived and designed by architectural practice WilkinsonEyre and structural engineering firm Gifford. The bridge is sometimes referred to as the 'Blinking Eye Bridge' or the 'Winking Eye Bridge' due to its shape and its tilting method. The Millennium Bridge stands as the sixteenth tallest structure in the city, and is shorter in stature than the neighbouring Tyne Bridge.
The Metropolitan Borough of Gateshead is a metropolitan borough in Tyne and Wear, in North East England. The borough forms the south west part of the county. It is named after its largest town, Gateshead, but also spans the towns of Rowlands Gill, Whickham, Blaydon and Ryton; suburban areas include Felling, Pelaw, Dunston and Low Fell.
The Euroborg, currently known as the Hitachi Capital Mobility Stadion or Hitachi Stadion for sponsorship reasons, is the stadium in Groningen, Netherlands. It is the home of football club FC Groningen, with a capacity of 22,525 seats. The stadium site houses a casino, movie theater, school, supermarket, and a fitness centre. A temporary railway station at the Euroborg Stadium opened in late 2007, and a permanent one opened in 2013. The stadium's seats are completely clad in the club's colors of green and white, with 1,000 seats available for supporters of the away team.
Gateshead International Stadium (GIS) is a multi-purpose, all-seater venue in Gateshead, Tyne and Wear, England. Originally known as the Gateshead Youth Stadium, the venue was built in 1955 at a cost of £30,000. It has since been extensively re-developed on three occasions. Its capacity of around 11,800 is the greatest in the Metropolitan Borough of Gateshead, the third-largest in Tyne and Wear and the sixth-largest in North East England.
Foster + Partners is a British international studio for architecture and integrated design, with headquarters in London. The practice is led by its founder and chairman, Norman Foster, and has constructed many high-profile glass-and-steel buildings.
Football Club Groningen is a Dutch professional association football club based in the city of Groningen, Groningen province. The club competes in the Eredivisie, the highest football league of the Netherlands.
Arup is a British multinational professional services firm headquartered in London which provides engineering, architecture, design, planning, project management and consulting services for all aspects of the built environment. Founded by Sir Ove Arup in 1946, the firm has over 16,000 staff based in 96 offices across 35 countries around the world. Arup has participated in projects in over 160 countries.
Balfour Beatty plc is a British multinational infrastructure group based in the United Kingdom with capabilities in construction services, support services and infrastructure investments. A constituent of the FTSE 250 Index, Balfour Beatty works across the United Kingdom, Ireland, the United States, Canada and South East Asia.
WilkinsonEyre is an international architecture practice based in London, England. In 1983 Chris Wilkinson founded Chris Wilkinson Architects, he partnered with Jim Eyre in 1987 and the practice was renamed WilkinsonEyre in 1999. The practice has led the completion of many high-profiled projects such as Gateshead Millennium Bridge, Cooled Conservatories Gardens by the Bay, Oxford's Weston Library and Guangzhou International Finance Center.
Royal BAM Group nv is a Dutch construction-services business with headquarters in Bunnik, Netherlands. It is the largest construction company based on revenue in the Netherlands.
Gifford is part of the Ramboll Group, providing engineering consultancy, design, planning, project management and consulting services for buildings, infrastructure and the environment.
Newcastle City Centre, is the city centre of Newcastle upon Tyne, England. Newcastle city centre is the historical heart of the city and the main cultural and commercial centre of North East England. Along with nearby Gateshead town centre, which lies on the opposite side of the River Tyne, the city centre forms the central core of the Tyneside conurbation.
VolkerRail is a specialist railway infrastructure services company based in Doncaster, England, providing services across the United Kingdom and Ireland. It is wholly owned by Netherlands-based VolkerWessels, a multi-disciplinary construction and civil engineering group.
The Derwent Valley Railway was a branch railway in County Durham, England. Built by the North Eastern Railway, it ran from Swalwell to Blackhill via five intermediate stations, and onwards to Consett.
The Derby of the North is a common reference to the match between the Dutch football clubs FC Groningen and SC Heerenveen. Since the dissolution of BV Veendam in 2013, there remain four professional football clubs in the three northern provinces of the Netherlands; Groningen, Friesland, and Drenthe. Besides Groningen and Heerenveen, these are FC Emmen and Cambuur Leeuwarden. Although Heerenveen has an older and fiercer rivalry with Cambuur, only the match between Heerenveen and Groningen is commonly referred to as the Derby of the North. This is due to Heerenveen and Groningen being seen as representing the provinces of Friesland and Groningen, whereas Cambuur is only regarded as the team of the city of Leeuwarden and its immediate environment.
Northern Powerhouse Rail (NPR) is a proposed major rail programme designed to enhance substantially the economic potential of the North of England. Featuring new and significantly upgraded railway lines, it aims to transform rail services between the region’s towns and cities. It would be the region’s single biggest transport investment since the Industrial Revolution. It has sometimes been referred to it as HS3. Design of the network is to be coordinated with design of HS2 Phase 2b which, by 2035–2040, will provide high-speed services from Crewe to Manchester and from Birmingham to Leeds.
€191 million) (2017) [1]