Mark Horner

History | Geography | Economy
🏴󠁧󠁢󠁷󠁬󠁳󠁿 The Vale of Glamorgan (Bro Morgannwg), locally referred to as The Vale, is a county borough in the south-east of Wales. It borders Bridgend County Borough to the west, Cardiff to the east, Rhondda Cynon Taf to the north, and the Bristol Channel to the south. With an economy based largely on agriculture and chemicals, it is the southernmost unitary authority in Wales. Attractions include Barry Island Pleasure Park, the Barry Tourist Railway, Medieval wall paintings in St Cadoc's Church, Llancarfan, Porthkerry Park, St Donat's Castle, Cosmeston Lakes Country Park and Cosmeston Medieval Village. The largest town is Barry. Other towns include Penarth, Llantwit Major, and Cowbridge. There are many villages in the county borough.
History The area is the southernmost part of the county of Glamorgan. Between the 11th century and 1536 the area was part of the Lordship of Glamorgan.

In medieval times, the village of Cosmeston, near what is today Penarth in the south east of the county, grew up around a fortified manor house constructed sometime around the 12th century by the De Costentin family. The De Costentins, who originated on the Cotentin peninsula in northern France, were among the first Norman invaders of Wales in the early 12th century following William the Conqueror's invasion of neighbouring England in 1066. The village would have consisted of a number of small stone round houses, or crofts, with thatched roofs.

Clemenstone, to the west, was the seat of several high sheriffs of Glamorganshire, including John Curre who was known to have occupied the estate in 1712. William Curre, known to have lived in Clemenstone in 1766, was also an occupant of Itton Court in Monmouthshire. In the early 19th century, Lady Sale née Wynch, wife of Sir Robert Sale, spent much of her early life on the Clemenstone Estate.

In 1974, the Vale of Glamorgan Borough was created, with a population of 103,000. The Vale of Glamorgan was a second tier district, part of the new county of South Glamorgan, under the Local Government Act 1972. It created several problems in local governance, between the South Glamorgan County Council, Cardiff City Council and the Vale of Glamorgan Borough Council owing to their conflicting interests. It was a turbulent time for governance in the city of Cardiff, as for the first time in its history it had to share authority with the county council, which was larger and better resourced. In April 1996, the Vale of Glamorgan became a county borough (unitary authority) of Wales.
Geography Located immediately to the west of Cardiff between the M4 motorway and the Severn Estuary, the county borough of Vale of Glamorgan covers 33,097 hectares (130 square miles) and has 53 km (33 mi) of coastline. The physiographical district from which the modern administrative area derives its name is the slightly larger, generally low-lying area which extends from the River Kenfig in the west, eastwards as far as the Rhymney. The Pennant Sandstone scarp forms its northern boundary. The largest centre of population in the borough is Barry (51,502 inhabitants). Other towns include Cowbridge (6,180), Dinas Powys (7,799), Llantwit Major (10,621) and Penarth (22,083). Much of the population inhabits villages, hamlets and individual farms. The area is low-lying, with a maximum height of 137.3 metres (450 ft) above sea level at Tair Onen to the east of Cowbridge.

The borough borders Cardiff to the north east, Rhondda Cynon Taf to the north, Bridgend to the north west and the Bristol Channel to the south.

The yellow-grey cliffs on the Glamorgan Heritage Coast (which stretches between Gileston and Ogmore-by-Sea) are unique on the Celtic Sea coastline (i.e. Cornwall, Wales, Ireland and Brittany) as they are formed of a combination of Liassic limestone, shale and Carboniferous Limestone. The rocks were formed between 360 and 200 million years ago when the whole area lay underneath a warm, shallow sea at the start of the Jurassic period. Thus today the cliffs contain traces of Jurassic sea creatures, such as ammonites. The calcium carbonate (limestone) in the soil allows crops to be grown which would be difficult elsewhere in Wales. The Liassic limestone and Carboniferous Limestone are also used in the Vale as building materials; in previous centuries it was taken by sloops across the Bristol Channel to North Cornish ports such as Bude, Boscastle and Port Isaac to fertilise Cornwall's poor slate soils; the hard Devonian slate was brought back from Cornwall as a roofing material for houses in the Vale.

As the Glamorgan Heritage Coast faces westwards out to the Atlantic, it bears the brunt of onshore (westerly and south-westerly) winds: ideal for surfing, but a nuisance for ships sailing up the Bristol Channel to Cardiff. As in North Cornwall and South-West Ireland, the fierce Atlantic gales created ideal conditions for deliberate shipwrecking, which until 100 years ago was very common along the coast. Nash Point, Southerndown and Ogmore-by-Sea have some of the highest shipwreck victims on the coast of Wales; as recently as 1962 an oil tanker, the BP Driver, crashed into Nash Point during a violent westerly storm, was torn to shreds by the reefs and eventually sank, although the crew were saved by various Bristol Channel lifeboats and helicopters.
Economy The Vale of Glamorgan was determined to be the wealthiest area in Wales in a 2003 survey conducted by Barclays Bank that measured disposable income. Chemical industries are located to the east of the port of Barry while further inland the main activity is agriculture, especially beef and dairy cattle, with marketing facilities at Cowbridge.