So Tees Valley is bidding to be City of Culture 2025, Tees Valley not even a place never mind a city. Anyway perhaps the Vic could bid for the opening ceremony

I'm sure I read something somewhere a few year back for proposals of some kind for a Teesside City. It included Hartlepool, Middlesbrough, Stockton, Thornaby, Billingham, Eaglescliffe, Ingleby Barwick and Yarm etc. all in all the "city" would have had a population of near 600,000 people making it one of the biggest in UK. Isn't Stoke made up of 4/5 towns amalgamated into one City?

What a sickening prospect.

Why to I picture Alastair Brownlee sporting a pair of piss stained 'y fronts' as the Mayor of Teesside City?

It's always been a misleading justification for Boro's fickle fan base that Middlesbrough in terms of population is a small town, it is, more people live in Stockton though who'll still all support them. They actually have a big catchment area.

Same reason I think of Mila Kunis while in bed with the missus.

Comedy festival more like, the prospect made me laugh. Oh dear.

I laughed when I read that, however I also laughed when Glasgow won it and again when Hull did.

More annoying is the concept of Teesside and that Hartlepool being part of it just won't go away.

Middlesbrough, which is really what Tees Valley is about, is shi*hole, that hasn't even got a direct rail link to London or a decent real ale pub. Hartlepool hasn't even got bus links to most places, rail links that stop early evening, no bus station, hospital , court,shops or jobs, city of culture, they must be fooking joking.

What a joke absolutely unbelievable

You been down Baker Street in Boro? apparantly 2 real ale pubs there.. Sherlocks and The Twister Lip. Also one called Dr Phil's Real Ale House. Can't say I've been like but looking at trying it out soon.

Dr Phil's is run by a Pools fan too. It's in Linthorpe at the Roman Rd Junction.

But it wouldn't be any more of a city than it is now would it.
You can reorganize five mice and call them a rat but they are still just a group of mice.

A city of 600k people spread over 18-20 miles?

Hmmm.

Known as a 'micro pub' !?

A Pools fan who is also a bunker member.

All very good and serve up pretty decent real ale too, well worth seeking out for a couple of hours

Get the train and you can enjoy a few in The Rat Race on your outward and or return too

I was out the other week on a bit of a real ale trail, started out at the Wetherspoons in Billingham, moved on to Green Hops Ale pub on Billingham green, Wetherspoons in Norton, Wasps Nest ale pub and Golden Smog micro pub in Stockton and finished off in Storytellers. Cracking night and didn't have the same beer all night.

Loads of culture in Glasgow, one of the best cities in the UK. I have never been to Hull so can't comment, but the idea of Teeside entering does make me chuckle.

micro pubs Joe, not proper pubs . I have been to Dr Phils and Sherlocks and dont rate them

Hull...? Hull...?, came out of the docks once and passed the prison, a grim, redbrick Victorian looking place...it had two palm trees in pots at the prison entrance They were the nearest and only thing vaguely related culture I ever sww in Hull .
Rumour has it that Stockton and Middlesbrough are already battling over who gets the Parmo Experience Museum built in their towns.

Ah I see. I don't mind a micro pub as they usually have a decent selection of bottle beer, some I think are quite restrictive as they get the beers on tap from the same supplier. I tried Jaxx at the weekend, it's not bad but not a huge selection.

And the monkey gallows as centre stage ?

I thought we are in county Durham not Teesside. That's what I was taught at school 40 years back. I'm from county Durham and proud of it. not smog ridden Teesside. Hartlepool county Durham please.

According to tonights Mail, .... 'Town's delight as City of Culture plan is revealed' is the headline on page 4
. But... it doesn't actually say who is enjoying this delight, it just quotes the head of culture and information at the council and I'd be utterly amazed if he said anything to the contrary.
So who's celebrating, I've done my usual evening drive around town and encountered no fireworks, no throngs of people weeping tears of joy, no majestic conga chains tying a human knot around the balls roundabout or seething street parties... just the 'watcher' asleep next to the old Gray Art Gallery, he appeared underwhelmed.

Joe - I have been spoilt by drinking in the Rat Race, one of the best micros. Dont mind micro pubs, but my preference is for traditional pubs that serve a good selection of beers in decent knob head free environments. The main problem I find with micro pubs is they without good management can quickly become cliquey and the preserve of a chosen few. I know this from a bad experience I had in one. Was in the Green Hops in Billingham last night, was okay. A lot of these new micros are basically pubs opened by people who were once regulars of earlier micro pubs. Nowt wrong with that, except more pubs are opening, but they are serving the same group of drinkers. No need to work out the maths, it is spreading the dwindling band of drinkers out even more thinly, which cant be good. Also some of the new micro pubs are selling lager and spirits, which is very risky IMHO. There seems to be too much choice now as well , which makes drinking ever more complicated, real or craft, Irish Cider, Belguim IPA, people just seem to be making things up to make money. Fook theres a point, why havent I realised this before

When I was in the Green Hops the other week there was a group of around 6 lads just drinking bottled stella which isn't the sort of vibe you'd want from a real ale place. Proper ale pubs are superb, that's why I love York so much. Me and a mate won a tour round Ossett brewery few year back and the head brewer took us out on the night to Wakefield, that also has some cracking ale pubs if you can find them. One in particular called Fernandes which is 3 floors. It does seem to be getting into a bit of a fad with all the craft beer stuff recently, Marks and Spencers have jumped on the bandwagon and released a selection.

Well if you go back another 10 years, when they removed the border guard betweeon Old Hartlepool and West, the following year they did actually create a borough called Teesside and we weren't in it.

So I see no need to reinvent history; just do the same thing again.

Note: Teeside eventually got swallowed up by Cleveland in the moronic local government reorganization of the 70s and the individual "towns" were reborn (except they only vaguely corresponded to any town that had ever existed before). Then in the 1990s the equally moronic disbandment of Cleveland followed (not moronic in principle, just in the modus operandi).

PS: (puts devil's advocate hat on) Hartlepool does actually touch the Tees; take a quick walk to North Gare for the proof.
https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/ ... or_map.svg

County Durham Monty. always has been always will be in my heart. About the border guards we should of had more.cos we got mugged off west and still getting mugged off west. We should of bricked Throston bridge up but that's another pipe dream. Anyways were all united at pools let's see if Ronnie can do his magic this season. Haway the lads

If it was purely based on East Hull then there's no chance it would've come here. It is rather grim. They must've promoted the old town area and marina where a lot of money has been invested (similar to what happened with the marina in Hartlepool and the "Teesside Regeneration" carry on when I were a lad). The area around the university is also very smart now, trendy yuppie vibe thing going on now. Agreed though, the palm trees outside the nick have always puzzled me.

Ah, Cleveland County or Toxic on Tees as we called it at work. The bastard offspring of Teessides ambition and Hartleppols naivety. No one I know missed it when it went. There was only ever one beneficiary from its creation and that was little old Middlesbrough as the before and after pics prove. Hartlepool just stagnated during Clevelands existence and as I recall, spent most of their time trying to shut Pools down while working their puddings off to get the Riverside open on time.
If you buy the Gazette and chant 'Come on boro'', you're Teesside, we don't..

Spent my 50th in Antwerp, great city. Manchester is my no 1 place for real ale pubs, was there last week, have to say though as a city Manchester is becoming a bit busy for my liking, talk about the Northern Powerhouse, you couldnt hear yourself think for building work going on. The old pubs are still there, but Manchester is losing a lot of its soul IMHO, becoming like a mini London, Liverpool is much quieter with some cracking pubs.

Had a day in Stockport and visited Robinsons Brewery and a few pubs.

Going to the Ouseburn area of Newcastle on Sunday for a crawl,recommend that if you havent already been. Start off at the Central in Gateshead, then 10 min walk via the millenium bridge onto the Ouseburn, where you can visit the Free Trade, The Tyne ( live music outside on a summer Sunday afternoon) The Cluny, Cumberland, Ship and finish up at the Tanners, before heading back into the City Centre, possibly stopping for one in the New Bridge before crossing the bridge over the ring road.

Cleveland County 'screwed' Hartlepool, just before it was 'wound up' they sold all the land where Bishop Cuthbert is and the rest right up to Hart, £10 million I believe. Every one thought Hartlepool would get a share but it all 'disappeared' into a 'black hole'
The new organisation Tees Valley Unlimited, our Council have decided there won't be a referendum have decided we will part off. For me the Councillors are hoping there maybe a nice little earner for them on the committee or whatever it might be called.