Banbridge, NIR - Postcode - BT32 4AY - Post Codes & Zip Codes List

Description of Banbridge

Banbridge is a town in County Down, Northern Ireland. It is on the River Bann and the A1 road and is named after a bridge erected over the River Bann in 1712. It is situated in the civil parish of Seapatrick and the medieval barony of Iveagh Upper, Upper Half. The town began as a coaching stop on the road from Belfast to Dublin and thrived from Irish linen industry. The town was home to the headquarters of the previous Banbridge District Council. Following a reform of local administration in Northern Ireland in 2015, Banbridge became part of Armagh City, Banbridge and Craigavon Borough Council. It has a population of 16,637 in the 2011 Census.

The town's main thoroughfare is particularly odd, climbing up a steep incline before levelling out. In 1834 an underpass was erected as horses with big loads would faint before reaching the top of the slope. It was erected by William Dargan and is officially named 'Downshire Bridge', yet it is often called "The Cut".

Historical Description of Banbridge

Banbridge, home to the "Star of the County Down", is a relatively young town, first entering recorded history around 1691 during the aftermath of the struggle between William III and James II. An Outlawry Court was set up in the town to deal with the followers of James. The town grew up around the site where the main road from Belfast to Dublin crossed the River Bann over an Old Bridge which was situated where the present bridge now stands.

The town owes its success to flax and the linen industry, being the primary linen producing district in Ireland by 1772 with a total of 26 bleachgreens along the Bann. By 1820 the town was the centre of the 'Linen Homelands' and its popularity expanded when it became a staging stop on the mail coach route between Dublin and Belfast. A gift of £500 from the Marquis of Downshire around this time helped to alleviate some problems with the steepness of the road and paid for significant improvements. This industry has now greatly diminished in prominence, but Banbridge still has three of the major producers in Ulster; Weavers, Thomas Ferguson & Co, and John England Irish Linen.

County Down Places and PostCode / ZipCode List

Down County Post Code & Zip Code Category:

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Description of Down

One of the thirty-two counties that make up the island of Ireland, County Down is also one of Northern Ireland's six constituent counties and Ulster's nine.

With a total size of 961 square miles (2,490 square kilometers) and a population of 531.665, it is the largest city in the country by both measures. It is bounded to the north by County Antrim, the east by the Irish Sea, the west by County Armagh, and the south by County Louth across Carlingford Lough.

Strangford Lough and the Ards Peninsula are located in the eastern part of the county. Bangor, located on the seashore in the north, is the major city. It has borders with County Armagh to the west, and Lisburn and Belfast to the north, both of which are major urban centers. Down is home to both the southernmost point in Northern Ireland (Cranfield Point) and the easternmost point in Ireland (Burr Point).

History of Down

Ptolemy claims that the Voluntii tribe settled in the area at the turn of the second century AD. Between the years 400 and 1177, County Down was an integral part of the Ulaid kingdom. The territory of Ulaid was frequently attacked by Vikings in the eighth and ninth centuries, but great local resistance prevented any Norse from settling there permanently. Retaliating for the Ulaiden's rejection to grant him asylum from Brian Boru the year before, Sigtrygg Silkbeard led a fleet on a series of raids across the region in 1001.

In 1177, the Normans attacked and took over the area. English and Scottish settlers began arriving in the area from the year 1180 and continued through the 1600s. In 1569, "An Act for converting of Countries that be not yet Shire Grounds into Shire Grounds" was passed by the Irish Parliament. With the help of this law, a commission was established in 1570 "to survey and make enquiry in the countries and territories... that are not shire ground, or are doubtful to what shire they belong; to limit and nominate them a shire or county; to divide them into countries, baronies, or hundreds, or to join them to any existing shire or barony."

Geography of Down

You can find the county's coastline on both Belfast Lough and Carlingford Lough (both of which have access to the sea). In between the Ards Peninsula and the main land is Strangford Lough. In addition, Down includes some of Lough Neagh's shoreline. Smaller loughs include Castlewellan Lake and Lough Island Reavy in the town of Castlewellan, Clea Lough in the town of Killyleagh, Lough Money and Loughinisland in the town of Downpatrick, and Silent Valley Reservoir, Ben Crom Reservoir, Spelga Dam, and Lough Shannagh in the Mourne Mountains.

County Antrim is separated from the rest of Northern Ireland by the Lagan River. A large portion of the county's southwest is located along the River Bann. The Clanrye and Quoile rivers are also nearby.

Mew Island, Light House Island, and the Copeland Islands are only a few of the many islands just off the Down coast, to the north of the Ards Peninsula. You can find Gunn Island just off the Lecale shore. In addition, Strangford Lough is dotted with several itty-bitty islets.

Northern Ireland, UK Description

Northern Ireland is a constituent state of the United Kingdom, located in the island of Ireland's northeastern quadrant, on the western continental periphery commonly referred to as Atlantic Europe. It is the only part of the United Kingdom that is not part of the European Union. Northern Ireland is occasionally referred to as Ulster, despite the fact that it consists of only six of the nine counties that comprised that historic Irish province.

A long history of newcomers and emigrants has shaped Northern Ireland, which has welcomed Celts from Europe's continental shores as well as Vikings, Normans, and Anglo-Saxons. Over the course of the 17th century, thousands of Scottish Presbyterians were forcibly resettled and English military garrisons were established, resulting in the institutionalization of the ethnic, religious, and political divisions that eventually led to violent conflict.

Since the 1920s, when Northern Ireland was officially separated from the Republic of Ireland, the region has been wracked by sectarian violence. It doesn't matter how serious Northern Ireland's peacemaking efforts have been since the mid-1990s; those who are familiar with the shibboleths and cultural codes that define its peoples are the best equipped to navigate the region, dictating which football (soccer) team to root for, which whiskey to sip, and which song to sing. An old graffito once scrawled on the walls of Belfast captures the complexities of those political markers: "If you are not confused, you do not understand the situation." Outsiders are increasingly familiar with Northern Ireland because of its contributions to world culture, including poetry by Seamus Heaney and music by Van Morrison. However, Northern Ireland's political fortunes have improved since then, and with that improvement has come a flourishing of the arts.

Located in Northern Ireland's capital, Belfast, a modern city whose historic core was severely damaged by aerial bombardment during World War II. Belfast, once known for its shipyards (where the Titanic was built), has seen a significant reduction in the size of its industrial base. Aesthetically, the city is similar to Northern Ireland's other major cities, Londonderry (also known as Derry locally and historically) and Armagh, in that it is adorned with parks and orderly residential neighborhoods. It is even more beautiful in Northern Ireland's countryside: lush, fertile, and dotted with rivers and lakes. These features, as well as the country's folk and artistic traditions, have found poetic expression in the country's folk and artistic traditions.

Geographical Description of Northern Ireland

On the island of Ireland, Northern Ireland occupies approximately one-sixth of the total land area. It is separated from Scotland, which is also a part of the United Kingdom, on the east by the narrow North Channel, which is only 13 miles (21 kilometers) wide at one point and forms a natural border with the Republic of Ireland. The Irish Sea separates Northern Ireland from England and Wales on the east and southeast, respectively, and the Atlantic Ocean separates it from the rest of the world on the north. The Republic of Ireland forms the southern and western borders of the United Kingdom of Great Britain and Northern Ireland.

In terms of topography, Northern Ireland can be thought of as a saucer with its center at Lough (lake) Neagh, and the highlands can be considered the inverted rim of that saucer. On the rim of the saucer, five of Ireland's six historic counties—Antrim, Down, Armagh, Tyrone and Londonderry—converge to form the lake, and each has its own highland region that extends from its shores. Towards the north and east, Antrim's mountains (which are actually a plateau) rise steeply from the sea and slope upward. It reaches an elevation of 1,817 feet (554 bmetres) at Trostan, with the plateau terminating in an impressive basalt and chalk cliff coastline, broken by a series of glaciated valleys known as glens and facing Scotland, but otherwise isolated from the remainder of Northern Ireland. Slieve Croob (which rises to 1,745 feet (532 metres) in the southeast) and the Mourne Mountains (which reach an elevation of 2,789 feet (850 metres) at Slieve Donard (Northern Ireland's highest point) are all within two miles (3 kilometers) of each other in the southwest. In the southeast, the rounded landscape of drumlins—smooth, elongated mounds left by the final Pleistocene glaciation' South of Carlingford Lough, this magnificent landscape of granite peaks is bordered by the Atlantic Ocean.

The scenery is gentler south of Lough Neagh, but the land rises to a height of 1,886 feet (575 metres) in Slieve Gullion, near the Irish border, where the land rises to 1,886 feet (575 metres). West of Lough Neagh, the land gently rises to the more rounded Sperrin Mountains; Sawel, at 2,224 feet (678 metres), is the highest of several 2,000-foot-plus hills in the area; Sawel is also the highest point in the area (610 metres). Located in the far southwest, historically known as County Fermanagh, the region is geographically centered on the basin of Lough Erne, in a drumlin-strewn area surrounded by hills rising to more than 1,000 feet (300 metres) in elevation.

The Economy of Northern Ireland

Because of its close ties to the rest of the United Kingdom, Northern Ireland's economy is inextricably intertwined with it. Trade between Northern Ireland and its closest neighbor, the Republic of Ireland, has grown significantly in recent years despite the fact that economic ties between the two countries have historically been underdeveloped. Northern Ireland's economy has long been underperforming in comparison to the rest of the United Kingdom, owing largely to political and social unrest on the island of Ireland. The International Fund for Ireland was established in the 1980s by the governments of the United Kingdom and Ireland to aid in the development of the country's economy. Providing economic assistance to the entire island, with a particular emphasis on Northern Ireland, the fund's mission is to alleviate poverty. The European Union also provides financial assistance to the Northern Ireland government and its citizens.