Port Talbot

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Coordinates: 51°35′26″N 3°47′55″W / 51.59055°N 3.79859°W / 51.59055; -3.79859

Port Talbot
Port Talbot Centre.jpg
The A48 road near the centre of Port Talbot
Port Talbot is located in Neath Port Talbot
Port Talbot

 Port Talbot shown within Neath Port Talbot
Population 46,563 
OS grid reference SS755895
Principal area Neath Port Talbot
Ceremonial county West Glamorgan
Country Wales
Sovereign state United Kingdom
Post town PORT TALBOT
Postcode district SA12, SA13
Dialling code 01639
Police South Wales
Fire Mid and West Wales
Ambulance Welsh
EU Parliament Wales
UK Parliament Aberavon
Welsh Assembly Aberavon
List of places: UK • Wales • Neath Port Talbot

Port Talbot (play /pərˈtɔːlbət/ or /pərˈtælbət/[1]) is a town in Neath Port Talbot, Wales. It had a population of 35,633 in 2001.[2]

Contents

[edit] History

Port Talbot grew out of the original small port and market town of Aberafan (English: Aberavon), which belonged to the medieval Lords of Afan. The area of the parish of Margam lying on the west bank of the lower Afan became industrialised following the establishment of a copperworks in 1770. A dock was opened in 1839 and named for the Talbot family,[3] local landowners who were related to the pioneer photographer, William Henry Fox Talbot. The Talbots were patrons of Margam Abbey, an ancient Cistercian foundation, and also built Margam Castle. Christopher Rice Mansel Talbot (1803–1890) (Liberal Member of Parliament for Glamorgan from 1830 until his death) saw the potential of his property as a site for an extensive ironworks, which opened in early 1831.

CRM Talbot's daughter Emily Charlotte Talbot (1840–1918) inherited her father's fortune and became just as notable in the development of ports and railways. With assistance from engineers Charles Meik and Patrick Meik, she set about creating a port and railway system to attract business away from Cardiff and Swansea. The Port Talbot Railway and Docks Company opened a dock at Port Talbot and the Llyfni Railway in 1897, followed by the Ogmore Valley Extension and the South Wales Mineral Junction Railway (almost all these lines were closed as part of the Beeching Axe cuts in the mid 1960s, but some bridges and viaducts remain and many of these railway routes have re-emerged as recreational cycle tracks). By 1900, the dock was exporting over 500,000 tons of coal; it reached a peak of over three million tons in 1923. In the same year, the borough of Port Talbot was created, incorporating Margam, Cwmafan and the older town of Aberavon.[3]

In 1952 the completion of the Abbey Works made Port Talbot the home of one of Europe's largest integrated steelworks and (with 18,000 employees) the largest employer in Wales. This was followed by the establishment of a chemical plant at Baglan Bay by BP in the 1960s. In 1970 a new deep-water harbour was opened by Queen Elizabeth II and the Duke of Edinburgh. The new harbour was capable of discharging iron ore vessels of 100,000 deadweight,[4] a tenfold improvement on the old dock. By the early 21st century, due to further modification and dredging, the harbour is capable of harbouring vessels of over 170,000 deadweight.[5]

[edit] Governance

File:Porttalbotarms.PNG
Arms of the former Port Talbot Borough Council

Following the demise of the West Glamorgan county council, the Port Talbot borough council was reorganised with Neath into the new unitary authority of Neath Port Talbot in 1996.

[edit] Geography

Margam Castle, not far from Margam Abbey

The town is built along the eastern rim of Swansea Bay in a narrow strip of coastal plain surrounding the River Afan Estuary. Swansea is visible on the opposite side of Swansea Bay. The local beach is known as Aberavon Sands and is situated along the edge of the bay between the River Afan and the River Neath. The other beach in Port Talbot is Margam Sands, popularly known as Morfa Beach. The north-eastern edge of the town is marked by the River Neath. A very significant landmark in the town is the Port Talbot Steelworks.

Air quality in the Port Talbot Air Quality Management Area, although poor in the past, has now greatly improved. However, the town is still said to be the most polluted place in Wales and the most polluted in the United Kingdom outside of London[citation needed]. Information on Air Quality in Port Talbot can be found on the Air Quality Section of the NPT Council Website www.npt.gov.uk/airquality

[edit] Sport

Sporting teams in Port Talbot include:

Margam Forest to the northeast of the Port Talbot is used as a venue for a stage of the annual Wales Rally GB. In the past, the rally route has traversed Margam Country Park.

Afan Forest Park to the north of the town has a number of dedicated mountain biking trails.

Port Talbot has an array of higher level football. With two historically dominant football teams in the town (Port Talbot Town F.C. and Afan Lido F.C.), also Welsh Football League First Division high-flyers Goytre United F.C. are based just outside of Port Talbot. The town's nearest Welsh Premier League team is Neath Athletic A.F.C, which is only located a few miles away from Port Talbot. Llanelli A.F.C., Swansea City F.C. and Cardiff City F.C. are also large clubs which are in close vicinity of Port Talbot.

[edit] Education

There are five comprehensive schools situated within the Port Talbot area:

A campus of Neath Port Talbot College is located in the Margam area. The Margam campus was previously called Afan College.

[edit] South Wales Miners' Museum

The South Wales Miners' Museum is located in Cynonville, Cymmer.

[edit] Community Archives Wales, Port Talbot Historical Society

Port Talbot Historical Society is a society founded in 1954 and based in Sandfields Library, in the Communities First area of Sandfields.

The group is dedicated to the research and recording of local history and have published a number of books over the years. There is a core of 10 -15 active members who will be engaged in the Community Archives Wales project aiming to archive this information digitally.

[edit] Media

In 2005 the area was granted its first radio station when Afan FM, the inspiration of a group of local young people headed by 19-year-old Craig Williams, was awarded a five-year licence by Ofcom to serve Port Talbot and neighbouring Neath. Afan FM transmitted on 107.9FM and online via its website. The station was based at a broadcasting centre housed within the AquaDome Leisure Complex on Aberavon Seafront but, following a December 2009 fire at the AquaDome, moved to Aberafan House, an office complex adjacent to the town's shopping centre. In late 2011 it was announced that Afan FM was to shut after an unexpected tax bill; it ceased live broadcasting at 2pm on 13 December 2011.

The area is also served by The Wave (96.4FM), Swansea Sound (1170MW), Bay Radio (102.1FM), Real Radio (106.0FM) and Nation Radio (107.3FM), all of which are available on DAB. Radio Phoenix also operates a 24 hour hospital radio service for the patients & staff of Neath Port Talbot Hospital in Baglan Moors.

The town is served by several newspapers. The Port Talbot Guardian was a weekly paper published by Media Wales, part of the Trinity Mirror group, but ceased publication in October 2009. The Swansea-based daily South Wales Evening Post and the weekly Courier and Tribune are also distributed in the town and are published by South West Wales Publications, part of the Northcliffe Media group.

Neath Port Talbot Council publish a quarterly newsletter entitled "Pride" - which is delivered to every home in the Neath Port Talbot area.

Cân i Gymru is usually filmed in Port Talbot. Also TV programmes such as Doctor Who and The Sarah Jane Adventures have filmed in this town.

[edit] Transport

Port Talbot is served by the South Wales Main Line at Port Talbot Parkway railway station. South Wales travel to Goytre and other places where there are local as well as direct intercity trains to Swansea, Cardiff, London and Manchester. Port Talbot bus station, located adjacent to the Aberafan Centre in the centre of the town is the main bus transport hub in the town. It is a National Express stop. Local bus services are provided by First Cymru, South Wales Transport & Veolia Transport Cymru. The bus station's layout is very distinctive for the fact that buses always have to perform a 270° clockwise turn to exit the station.

The M4 motorway cuts through the town from southeast to northwest, crossing a central area on a concrete viaduct, junctions 38 to 41 serve Port Talbot, with junctions 40 and 41 being in the commercial heart of the town. This busy urban stretch of the M4, with tight bends, 2-lane carriageways, short narrow slip roads and concrete walls on both sides, was the first length of motorway in Wales when it opened to traffic in 1966.[6] The road has a speed limit of 50 mph (80 km/h) enforced with a speed camera in the eastbound direction. The stretch through Port Talbot town centre is a particular traffic congestion blackspot and there have been calls to close the slip roads at junctions 40 and 41 to improve traffic flow.[7] However some commuters oppose this plan since it would add more time to their journey. A new dual carriageway relief road, the Port Talbot Peripheral Distribution Road (PDR)[4], is planned for completion in 2012. The new carriageway will serve as a distributor road to the southwest of Port Talbot, beginning at M4 Junction 38 ending near Junction 41.

The Port Talbot Docks complex consist of an inner set of floating docks and an outer tidal basin. Construction of the tidal basin began in 1964 and the whole basin covers about 500 acres (2.0 km2).[8] The tidal basin is capable of handling ships of up to 170,000 dwt and is used mostly for the import of iron ore and coal for use by nearby Port Talbot Steelworks. The inner floating docks were constructed in 1898[9] and were closed in 1959. They were re-opened in 1998 for commercial shipping but in March 2007 for the import of some steel products[10] and are capable of handling ships of up to 8,000 dwt.[11] There have been proposals for the development of an intermodal freight terminal at the port.

The Transport Scientist, Luke Turner, comes from Port Talbot. He is credited with inventing the world's first time machine. The Welsh Wonder WONHUNDRED. He sold it to NASA for an undisclosed amount.

[edit] Economy

Water vapour rises in front of the blast furnaces at Port Talbot Steelworks

Heavy industry is a visible feature of Port Talbot's economy. The coastal strip of the town features Port Talbot Steelworks, a large BOC Industrial Gases plant and a gas-fired power station. Three further power plants are being planned or commissioned: at Margam adjacent to the BOC plant, near the Aberavon Beach sea front and a recently announced £60m project within Corus to utilise by-product gases.[citation needed]

On 20 November 2007, the Department for Business, Enterprise and Regulatory Reform (BERR) granted consent for the world's largest biomass power station to be built at Port Talbot.[12] This is expected to begin operation in 2010, and to provide enough electricity (from wood from environmentally-managed forests, mostly in North America) to supply half the homes in Wales with electricity.

Potential future development currently centres around the peripheral distributor road to the south, Baglan Industrial Park and Baglan Energy Park to the west, Port Talbot Docks to the southwest, Margam Country Park to the east and the Afan Valley to the north. In March 2009 Neath Port Talbot County Borough Council announced a regeneration project for Port Talbot town centre and docks, with a masterplan for new homes, offices, light industry, retail developments and improvements to the railway station.[13]

[edit] Socio-economic factors

A recent local council research project into industry revealed that 37.4% of Port Talbot's workforce belong in the public sector, notably Health and Social Care, the county is expecting an economic downfall after the recent spending cuts were revealed under the new government. Port Talbot is also the site for Neath Port Talbot General Hospital, which houses a psychiatric ward and drug rehabilitation centre, including a Juvenile wing which provides temporary emergency care for 15-18 year olds lasting up to seven days before being placed in a secure psychiatric unit.

[edit] Blue Flag beach

The beach area of the town has been improved and the council announced it has been awarded the Blue Flag beach status for water quality and beach facilities.[14]The beach was also awarded the Blue Flag beach in 2010 for the second time. The beach area also houses the largest sculpture in Wales titled "Kite tail"[15]

[edit] Notable people

See Category:People from Port Talbot
  • William Abraham (1842–1922, b. Cwmafan), trade unionist and politician;
  • Martyn Ashton, British mountain bike trials former world champion and multiple British champion, lives in Port Talbot.
  • Keith Barnes, Australian rugby league great was born in Port Talbot before emigrating aged 13.
  • Robert Blythe, Welsh actor, was brought up in Tan y Groes Street. Currently (2009) plays Fagin Hepplewhite in the BBC comedy High Hopes.
  • Di Botcher, Welsh comedy actress
  • Rob Brydon, actor and comedian was brought up in Baglan, Port Talbot.
  • Richard Burton was born in Pontrhydyfen, Port Talbot as Richard Jenkins and had his early education in Port Talbot where he met his mentor, Philip H. Burton.
  • Peg Entwistle, successful Broadway theatre actress whose 1932 suicide from atop the Hollywood sign in Los Angeles forever tagged her as "The Hollywood Sign Girl" was born at 5 Broad Street, Port Talbot on 5 February 1908.[16]
  • Professor Sir Christopher Evans, businessman, originally from Port Talbot, Wales,
  • William Evans (1883–1968), writer
  • Bernard Fox, actor, born Bernard Lawson.
  • Rhod Gilbert, comedian, lives in Port Talbot
  • James Hook, rugby union player, current Ospreys and Wales fly-half
  • Sir Anthony Hopkins, actor, was born and raised in Margam, Port Talbot.
  • Geoffrey Howe was born in Port Talbot and spent his early years there. When he was made a life peer in 1992 he chose the title Baron Howe of Aberavon.
  • Clive Jenkins (1926–1999), trade unionist.
  • Martyn Lloyd-Jones (1899–1981, b. Cardiff), Calvinistic Methodist minister who ministered Bethlehem Calvinistic Methodist Chapel, Sandfields, Aberafan from 1926 to 1938 prior to teaching at Westminster Chapel in London.
  • Michael Locke, aka 'Pancho' of TV series Dirty Sanchez, was born and brought up in Baglan, Port Talbot.
  • Dic Penderyn, was born as Richard Lewis in Aberavon in 1803, in the centre of what is now Port Talbot but before the town was named as such in 1840. He is buried at St. Mary's Church. [5] in the centre of the town. He was convicted of assault on an army soldier and executed.
  • Paul Potts, an opera singer and the winner of Britain's Got Talent in 2007, lives in Port Talbot.
  • Linda Sharp, champion surfer from Aberavon, won the European surfing championships twice, the British surfing championships ten times and the Welsh surfing championships 19 times[17]
  • Michael Sheen, Welsh actor was born in Newport but he was brought up in Port Talbot.
  • George Thomas, 1st Viscount Tonypandy was born in Tydraw Street, Port Talbot and was speaker in the House of Commons.
  • Andrew Vicari, painter was born in Port Talbot.
  • Freddie Williams, world speedway champion in the early 1950s was from Margam.
  • Colin Pascoe, former Swansea City, Sunderland and Wales international.
  • Richard Winpenny, Professor of Inorganic Chemistry, The University of Manchester [6] and director of The Photon Science Institute at the University of Manchester [7]
  • Captain Beany, celebrity charity fundraiser, and celebrity look-a-like.

[edit] Sea rescue

Port Talbot coastguard celebrated its centenary in 2008 with a proud history of rescues in the last 100 years. The crew are now the mud rescue team for the Swansea Bay area.

2007 was a typically busy year with a beached whale making world news. They also took part in flood relief efforts in Gloucester and while all are volunteers, they spent Christmas morning responding to pagers after it was thought a whale had come ashore once more which turned out to be a log, much to everyone's relief. Updates can be found at http://www.ptcg.co.uk

[edit] See also

[edit] References

  1. ^ (1999) Collins Concise Dictionary, HarperCollins, Glasgow, ISBN 0 00 472257 4
  2. ^ http://www.statistics.gov.uk/downloads/census2001/ks_ua_ew_part1.pdf
  3. ^ a b John Davies, Nigel Jenkins, Menna Baines and Peredur I. Lynch, ed. (2008). The Welsh Academy Encyclopedia of Wales. Cardiff: University of Wales Press. pp. 697. 
  4. ^ [1]
  5. ^ [2]
  6. ^ The Motorway Archive. M4 in Wales - Coryton to Baglan
  7. ^ ‘End road chaos by closing M4 slip road’ - icWales
  8. ^ Port Talbot Coastguard Search and Rescue Emergency Team History
  9. ^ Complete.pdf
  10. ^ Port Talbot Docks Handles First Steel Cargo For Nearly Four Decades
  11. ^ Associated British Ports
  12. ^ "£400M Wood Chip Plant Approved". BBC News. 21 November 2007. http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/wales/south_west/7105124.stm. Retrieved 22 May 2010. 
  13. ^ NPT CBC - Port Talbot Consultation
  14. ^ Press Releases - 22 May 2008
  15. ^ [3]
  16. ^ Page Title
  17. ^ Steve England (July 2004). "Carve Greatest British Surfer poll". Surfers Village. http://www.surfersvillage.com/news.asp?Id_news=13510&Region=Spare+. Retrieved 15 February 2010. 

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