Sovereign state United Kingdom Region North East England Area rank 166th Ceremonial county County Durham | Constituent country England Admin. HQ Darlington Area 197.6 km² University Darlington College | |
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Time zone Greenwich Mean Time (UTC+0) Points of interest South Park, Head of Steam, Drinkfield Marsh Nature R, North Lodge Park, Piercebridge Roman Fort | ||
Darlington is a unitary authority area in the ceremonial county of County Durham, north-east England. It borders the non-metropolitan county of County Durham to the north and west, Stockton-on-Tees to the east and North Yorkshire to the south along the line of the River Tees. The urban centre of the borough is the town of Darlington and is a major component of the Tees Valley economic area. In 2011 it had a resident population of 106,000.
Contents
Map of Darlington, UK
Council
Traditionally part of County Durham, the current borough boundaries were formed on 1 April 1974 by the creation of a new non-metropolitan district of Darlington by the Local Government Act 1972, covering the previous county borough of Darlington along with nearly all of Darlington Rural District (the Newton Aycliffe parts of which went to Sedgefield). It remained part of County Durham until gaining "independence" as a unitary authority on 1 April 1997. For ceremonial purposes it remains part of County Durham with whom it continues to share certain local services such as Fire and Rescue and Police. It is included within the Tees Valley area for both cultural and regional government administration.
It is made up of 24 council wards, twenty within the town of Darlington itself, which are also covered by the Darlington parliamentary constituency and four rural wards of Heighington & Coniscliffe, Hurworth, Middleton St George and Sadberge & Whessoe (part of the Sedgefield parliamentary constituency.
As well as Darlington itself the borough includes the surrounding villages of:
It is also home to Durham Tees Valley Airport (previously known as Teesside International Airport), of which the borough council shares joint ownership with the other four Tees Valley councils and Peel Holdings.
The council operates a Leader and Cabinet model of political leadership although a group of local residents aimed to force a referendum on moving to a system with directly-elected executive Mayor. Their bid was unsuccessful.
The political composition of the council, as of a May 2011 local elections, is Labour 34; Conservative 14; Liberal Democrats 5.
Economy
This is a chart of trend of regional gross value added of Darlington at current basic prices published (pp. 240–253) by Office for National Statistics with figures in millions of British Pounds Sterling.
^1 includes hunting and forestry
^2 includes energy and construction
^3 includes financial intermediation services indirectly measured
^4 Components may not sum to totals due to rounding