Derry, Derry City and Strabane, Northern Ireland, United Kingdom

Economy | Inward investment | Economy : Retail | Education | Sport | Association football | Boxing | Rugby union | Basketball | Cricket | Golf | Culture | Media | Night-life | Events | Landmarks | Transport | Buses | Transport : Air | Railways

🇮🇪 Derry, officially Londonderry, is the second-largest city in Northern Ireland and the fifth-largest city on the island of Ireland. The old walled city lies on the west bank of the River Foyle, which is spanned by two road bridges and one footbridge. The city now covers both banks.

The district administered by Derry City and Strabane District Council contains both Londonderry Port and City of Derry Airport. Derry is close to the border with County Donegal, with which it has had a close link for many centuries. In 2013, Derry was the inaugural UK City of Culture.

Economy A long-term foreign employer in the area is Du Pont, which has been based at Maydown since 1958, its first European production facility. Originally Neoprene was manufactured at Maydown and subsequently followed by Hypalon. More recently Lycra and Kevlar production units were active. Thanks to a worldwide demand for Kevlar, which is made at the plant, the facility undertook a £40 million upgrade to expand its global Kevlar production.

Inward investment In recent years there has been a drive to increase inward investment in the city, concentrating on digital industries. As of 2002, the three largest private-sector employers were American firms. Economic successes have included call centres and a large investment by Seagate, which has operated a factory in the Springtown Industrial Estate since 1993. As of 2019, Seagate was employing approximately 1,400 people in Derry, producing more than half of the company's total requirement for hard drive read-write heads.

Other significant multinational employers in the region include Firstsource of India, INVISTA, Stream International, Perfecseal, NTL, Northbrook Technology of the United States, Arntz Belting and Invision Software of Germany, and Homeloan Management of the UK. Major local business employers include Desmonds, Northern Ireland's largest privately owned company, manufacturing and sourcing garments, E&I Engineering, St. Brendan's Irish Cream Liqueur and McCambridge Duffy, one of the largest insolvency practices in the UK.

Economy: Retail The city is the north west's foremost shopping district, housing two large shopping centres along with numerous shop packed streets serving much of the greater county, as well as Tyrone and Donegal.

The city centre has two main shopping centres; the Foyleside Shopping Centre which has 45 stores and 1,430 parking spaces, and the Richmond Centre, which has 39 retail units. The Quayside Shopping Centre also serves the city-side and there is also Lisnagelvin Shopping Centre in the Waterside. These centres, as well as local-run businesses, feature numerous national and international stores. Crescent Link Retail Park, located in the Waterside, has several chain stores and has become the second largest retail park in Northern Ireland.

Education Derry is home to the Magee Campus of Ulster University, formerly Magee College. However, Lockwood's 1960s decision to locate Northern Ireland's second university in Coleraine rather than Derry helped contribute to the formation of the civil rights movement that ultimately led to The Troubles. Derry was the town more closely associated with higher learning, with Magee College already more than a century old by that time. In the mid-1980s an attempt was made at address this by forming Magee College as a campus of the Ulster University, but this failed to stifle calls for the establishment of an independent University in Derry. As of 2021, the Magee campus reportedly accommodated approximately 4,400 students, out of a total Ulster University student population of approximately 24,000, of which 15,000 are in the Belfast campus.

The North West Regional College is also based in the city, and accommodates over 10,000 student enrolments annually.

Sport The city is home to sports clubs and teams. Both association football and Gaelic football are popular in the area.

Association football In association football, the city's most prominent clubs include Derry City who play in the national league of the Republic of Ireland; Institute of the NIFL Championship as well as Maiden City and Trojans, both of the Northern Ireland Intermediate League. In addition to these clubs, which all play in national leagues, other clubs are based in the city. The local football league governed by the IFA is the North-West Junior League, which contains many clubs from the city, such as BBOB (Boys Brigade Old Boys) and Lincoln Courts. The city's other junior league is the Derry and District League and teams from the city and surrounding areas participate, including Don Boscos and Creggan Swifts. The Foyle Cup youth soccer tournament is held annually in the city. It has attracted many notable teams in the past, including Werder Bremen, IFK Göteborg and Ferencváros.

Gaelic football

In Gaelic football Derry GAA are the county team and play in the Gaelic Athletic Association's National Football League, Ulster Senior Football Championship and All-Ireland Senior Football Championship. They also field hurling teams in the equivalent tournaments. There are many Gaelic games clubs in and around the city, for example Na Magha CLG, Steelstown GAC, Doire Colmcille CLG, Seán Dolans GAC, Na Piarsaigh CLG Doire Trasna and Slaughtmanus GAC.

Boxing There are many boxing clubs, the most well-known being The Ring Boxing Club, which is based on the City side, and associated with boxers Charlie Nash and John Duddy. Rochester's Amateur Boxing club is a club in the city's Waterside area.

Rugby union Rugby union is also quite popular in the city, with the City of Derry Rugby Club situated not far from the city centre. City of Derry won both the Ulster Towns Cup and the Ulster Junior Cup in 2009. Londonderry YMCA RFC is another rugby club and is based in the village of Drumahoe which is on the outskirts of the city.

Basketball The city's only basketball club is North Star Basketball Club which has teams in the Basketball Northern Ireland senior and junior Leagues.

Cricket Cricket is also played in the city, particularly in the Waterside. The city is home to two cricket clubs, Brigade Cricket Club and Glendermott Cricket Club, both of whom play in the North West Senior League.

Golf There are two golf clubs situated in the city, City of Derry Golf Club and Foyle International Golf Centre.

Culture Artists and writers associated with the city and surrounding countryside include the Nobel Prize-winning poet Seamus Heaney, poet Seamus Deane, playwright Brian Friel, writer and music critic Nik Cohn, artist Willie Doherty, socio-political commentator and activist Eamonn McCann and bands such as The Undertones. The large political gable-wall murals of Bogside Artists, Free Derry Corner, the Foyle Film Festival, the Derry Walls, St Eugene's and St Columb's Cathedrals and the annual Halloween street carnival are popular tourist attractions. In 2010, Derry was named the UK's tenth 'most musical' city by PRS for Music.

In May 2013 a perpetual Peace Flame Monument was unveiled by Martin Luther King III and Presbyterian minister Rev. David Latimer. The flame was lit by children from both traditions in the city and is one of only 15 such flames across the world.

Media The local newspapers, the Derry Journal (known as the Londonderry Journal until 1880) and the Londonderry Sentinel, reflect the divided history of the city: the Journal was founded in 1772 and is Ireland's second oldest newspaper; the Sentinel newspaper was formed in 1829 when new owners of the Journal embraced Catholic Emancipation, and the editor left the paper to set up the Sentinel.

There are numerous radio stations receivable: the largest stations based in the city are BBC Radio Foyle and the commercial station Q102.9.

There was a locally based television station, C9TV, one of only two local or 'restricted' television services in Northern Ireland, which ceased broadcasts in 2007.

Night-life The city's nightlife is mainly focused on the weekends, with several bars and clubs providing "student nights" during the weekdays. Waterloo Street and Strand Road provide the main venues. Waterloo Street, a steep street lined with both Irish traditional and modern pubs, frequently has live rock and traditional music at night.

Events • In 2013, Derry became the first city to be designated UK City of Culture, having been awarded the title in July 2010. • Also in 2013 the city hosted Radio 1's Big Weekend and the Lumiere festival. • The "Banks of the Foyle Hallowe'en Carnival" (known in Irish as Féile na Samhna) in Derry is a huge tourism boost for the city. The carnival is promoted as being the first and longest-running Halloween carnival in the whole of Ireland, It is called the largest street party in Ireland by the Derry Visitor and Convention Bureau with more than 30,000 ghoulish revellers taking to the streets annually. • In March, the city hosts the Big Tickle Comedy Festival, which in 2006 featured Dara Ó Briain and Colin Murphy. In April the city plays host to the City of Derry Jazz and Big Band Festival and in November the Foyle Film Festival, the biggest film festival in Northern Ireland. • The Siege of Derry is commemorated annually by the fraternal organisation the Apprentice Boys of Derry in the week-long Maiden City Festival. • The Instinct Festival is an annual youth festival celebrating the Arts. It is held around Easter and has proven a success in recent years. • Celtronic is a major annual electronic dance festival held at venues all around the city. The 2007 Festival featured the DJ, Erol Alkan. • The Millennium Forum is the main theatre in the city; it holds numerous shows weekly. • On 9 December 2007 Derry entered the Guinness Book of Records when 13,000 Santas gathered to break the world record, beating previous records held by Liverpool and Las Vegas. • Winner of the 2005 Britain in Bloom competition (City category). Runner-up 2009.

Landmarks Derry is renowned for its architecture. This can be primarily ascribed to the formal planning of the historic walled city of Derry at the core of the modern city. This is centred on the Diamond with a collection of late Georgian, Victorian and Edwardian buildings maintaining the gridlines of the main thoroughfares (Shipquay Street, Ferryquay Street, Butcher Street and Bishop Street) to the City Gates. St Columb's Cathedral does not follow the grid pattern reinforcing its civic status. This Church of Ireland Cathedral was the first post-Reformation Cathedral built for an Anglican church. The construction of the Roman Catholic St Eugene's Cathedral in the Bogside in the 19th century was another major architectural addition to the city. The Townscape Heritage Initiative has funded restoration works to key listed buildings and other older structures.

In the three centuries since their construction, the city walls have been adapted to meet the needs of a changing city. The best example of this adaptation is the insertion of three additional gates – Castle Gate, New Gate and Magazine Gate – into the walls in the course of the 19th century. Today, the fortifications form a continuous promenade around the city centre, complete with cannon, avenues of mature trees and views across Derry. Historic buildings within the city walls include St Augustine's Church, which sits on the city walls close to the site of the original monastic settlement; the copper-domed Austin's department store, which claims to be the oldest such store in the world; and the imposing Greek Revival Courthouse on Bishop Street. The red-brick late-Victorian Guildhall, also crowned by a copper dome, stands just beyond Shipquay Gate and close to the riverfront.

There are many museums and sites of interest in and around the city, including the Foyle Valley Railway Centre, the Amelia Earhart Centre And Wildlife Sanctuary, the Apprentice Boys Memorial Hall, Ballyoan Cemetery, The Bogside, numerous murals by the Bogside Artists, Derry Craft Village, Free Derry Corner, O'Doherty Tower (now home to part of the Tower Museum), the Harbour Museum, the Museum of Free Derry, Chapter House Museum, the Workhouse Museum, the Nerve Centre, St. Columb's Park and Leisure Centre, Creggan Country Park, Brooke Park, The Millennium Forum and the Foyle and Craigavon bridges.

Attractions include museums, a vibrant shopping centre and trips to the Giant's Causeway, which is approximately 50 miles (80 kilometres) away, though poorly connected by public transport. Lonely Planet called Derry the fourth best city in the world to see in 2013.

On 25 June 2011, the Peace Bridge opened. It is a cycle and footbridge that begins from the Guild Hall in the city centre of Derry City to Ebrington Square and St Columb's Park on the far side of the River Foyle. It was funded jointly by the Department for Social Development (NI), the Department of the Environment, Community and Local Government along with matching funding, totalling £14 million, from the SEUPB Peace III programme.

Future projects include the Walled City Signature Project, which intends to ensure that the city's walls become a world-class tourist experience.

Transport The transport network is built out of a complex array of old and modern roads and railways throughout the city and county. The city's road network also makes use of two bridges to cross the River Foyle, the Craigavon Bridge and the Foyle Bridge, the longest bridge in Ireland. Derry also serves as a major transport hub for travel throughout nearby County Donegal.

In spite of it being the second city of Northern Ireland (and it being the second-largest city in all of Ulster), road and rail links to other cities are below par for its standing. Many business leaders claim that government investment in the city and infrastructure has been badly lacking. Some have stated that this is due to its outlying border location whilst others have cited a sectarian bias against the region west of the River Bann due to its high proportion of Catholics. There is no direct motorway link with Dublin or Belfast. The rail link to Belfast has been downgraded over the years so that, presently, it is not a viable alternative to the roads for industry to rely on. As of 2008, there were plans for £1 billion worth of transport infrastructure investment in and around the district. Planned upgrades to the A5 Dublin road agreed as part of the Good Friday Agreement and St. Andrews Talks fell through when the government of the Republic of Ireland reneged on its funding citing the post-2008 economic downturn.

Buses Most public transport in Northern Ireland is operated by the subsidiaries of Translink. Originally the city's internal bus network was run by Ulsterbus, which still provides the city's connections with other towns in Northern Ireland. The city's buses are now run by Ulsterbus Foyle, just as Translink Metro now provides the bus service in Belfast. The Ulsterbus Foyle network offers 13 routes across the city into the suburban areas, excluding an Easibus link which connects to the Waterside and Drumahoe, and a free Rail Link Bus runs from the Waterside Railway Station to the city centre. All buses leave from the Foyle Street Bus Station in the city centre.

Long-distance buses depart from Foyle Street Bus Station to destinations throughout Ireland. Buses are operated by both Ulsterbus and Bus Éireann on cross-border routes. Lough Swilly formerly operated buses to Co. Donegal, but the company entered liquidation and is no longer in operation. There is a half-hourly service to Belfast every day, called the Maiden City Flyer, which is the Goldline Express flagship route. There are hourly services to Strabane, Omagh, Coleraine, Letterkenny and Buncrana, and up to twelve services a day to bring people to Dublin. There is a daily service to Sligo, Galway, Shannon Airport and Limerick.

Transport: Air City of Derry Airport, the council-owned airport near Eglinton, has grown during the early 21st century, with new investment in extending the runway and plans to redevelop the terminal.

The A2 (a dual carriageway) from Maydown to Eglinton, serves the airport. City of Derry airport is the main regional airport for County Donegal, County Londonderry and west County Tyrone as well as Derry City itself.

The airport is served by Loganair and Ryanair with scheduled flights to Glasgow Airport, Edinburgh Airport, Manchester Airport, Liverpool John Lennon Airport and London Stansted all year round with a summer schedule to Mallorca with TUI Airways

Railways The city is served by a single rail link that is subsidised, alongside much of Northern Ireland's railways, by Northern Ireland Railways (N.I.R.). The link primarily provides passenger services from the city to Belfast, via several stops that include Coleraine, Ballymoney, and Antrim, and connections to links with other parts of Northern Ireland. The route itself is the only remaining rail link used by trains; most of the lines developed in the mid-19th century fell into decline towards the mid-20th century from competition by new road networks. The original rail network that served the city included four different railways that, between them, linked the city with much of the province of Ulster, plus a harbour railway network that linked the other four lines, and a tramway on the City side of the Foyle. Usage of the rail link between Derry and Belfast remains questionable for commuters, due to the journey time of over two hours making it slower centre-to-centre than the 100-minute Ulsterbus Goldline Express service.

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Image: Photo by K. Mitch Hodge on Unsplash

Derry has a population of over 83,652 people. Derry also forms the centre of the wider Derry metropolitan area which has a population of over 237,000 people.

To set up a UBI Lab for Derry see: https://www.ubilabnetwork.org Twitter: https://twitter.com/UBILabNetwork

Twin Towns - Sister Cities Derry has links with:

🇨🇳 Dalian, China 🇺🇸 New Bedford, USA
Text Atribution: Wikipedia Text under CC-BY-SA license

Antipodal to Derry is: 172.683,-54.983

Locations Near: Derry -7.31667,54.9833

🇮🇪 Strabane -7.47,54.83 d: 19.7  

🇮🇪 Lifford -7.486,54.834 d: 19.8  

🇮🇪 Omagh -7.309,54.598 d: 42.8  

🇮🇪 Coleraine -6.667,55.017 d: 41.6  

🇮🇪 Cookstown -6.745,54.647 d: 52.3  

🇮🇪 Dungannon -6.77,54.5 d: 64.2  

🇮🇪 Magherafelt -6.606,54.755 d: 52.1  

🇮🇪 Monaghan -6.967,54.233 d: 86.4  

🇮🇪 Donegal -8.11,54.654 d: 62.6  

🇮🇪 Cavan -7.36,53.991 d: 110.4  

Antipodal to: Derry 172.683,-54.983

🇳🇿 Dunedin 170.474,-45.884 d: 18991.4  

🇳🇿 Invercargill 168.373,-46.413 d: 19015.4  

🇳🇿 Queenstown 168.658,-45.033 d: 18872.3  

🇳🇿 Christchurch 172.617,-43.517 d: 18740.1  

🇳🇿 Canterbury 171.58,-43.543 d: 18740.5  

🇳🇿 Richmond 173.183,-41.333 d: 18496.8  

🇳🇿 Nelson 173.284,-41.269 d: 18489.5  

🇳🇿 Wellington 174.767,-41.283 d: 18484.1  

🇳🇿 Hutt 174.917,-41.217 d: 18475.6  

🇳🇿 Lower Hutt 174.917,-41.217 d: 18475.6  

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