Confused about Portsmouth

[Al 10000]

I am very confused about the listings in the Portsmouth area.

I am asking about this as i was about to start putting lots of reviews of Portsmouth pubs onto the site,but i then found that what i thought were Portsmouth pubs are not listed on the Portsmouth list,they are listed under a seperate town which i think does'nt exist,this town is Soutsea which i always thought was a suburb of Portsmouth.
While i am writing this i am looking at ordnance survey sheet 196 which includes Portsmouth, i may be wrong but i though Portsmouth was a city with a population of about 190,000 and this city happens to be on Portsea island,there are a few suburbs of Portsmouth, milton, fratton, north end, eastney, and southsea.
If as i think all these suburbs are included in Portsmouths population why are some of them not listed on Portsmouths listing but under Southsea which i dont think is a town in its own right.

I hope some of our south coast members can put some light on this situation.

:cheers: very :confused: Alan.

[Galore Admin]

This is probably to do with Postal Towns (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Post_town) which are dictated by Royal Mail, so Southsea (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Southsea) is a location that they claim exists. Where there is confusion over the post town of a pub then we look up the postcode on Royal Mail and they tell us the Post Town of a given postcode, this is where areas hopefully come into their own as an area can exist in multiple Post Towns.

These Postal Towns have nothing to do with things like population counts which are done on a different border system (possibly electoral). We use Postal Towns as they are fixed, easy to look up on Royal Mail and fairly understandable. If we used the more recognised electoral we would have to change it every time a border change is made (as one is about to), and would be well beyond our ability to manage.

That is the technical answer, a local can probably give you a more historic answer

[Farway]

As a local I can confirm there really is a place called Southsea, you will have the wrath of thousands upon you by calling Southsea a suburb of Portsmouth

The town central railway station is "Portsmouth & Southsea" [or in dialect Portsmuff & Sarfsea]

Henry the 8th watched the Mary Rose sink from Southsea Castle, in fact he [not personally] built the castle

The areas may have merged a bit over the centuries, but Arthur Conan Doyle lived in Southsea, not Portsmouth, that bit was reserved for Charles Dickens

The Cockle Shell heroes trained on Canoe Lake in Southsea

Plus the Great South Run starts & ends on Southsea sea front

Good God, next you will be saying Lee on the Solent is a suburb of Gosport

Mutter, mutter, mutter etc :evilgrin:

[Al 10000]

Hi Farway,

This was a genuine question and i still think that Southsea is not a proper town and has such should'nt have a seperate town listing to Portsmouth.

It may have been a town in henry the 8ths time but many such towns have been incorporated into larger towns or cities.

I was asking this question because i was going to review a pub in Portsmouth or is that Southsea which has no review and no area set for it yet, and i did'nt want to put it in the wrong area.
If you want to put this pub in an area it is the Red,White and Blue i did this pub when it was a Gales tied house and it sold a very good pint of Gales best bitter and HSB.

Cheers still :confused: Alan

[NickDavies]

Questions like this cause a right old flap. Ask anyone who lives in Hove Actually.

[rpadam]

Given that the main station is called Portsmouth and Southsea, surely that indicates that Southsea is a different place (otherwise it would just be called Portsmouth)?

[Farway]

Hi Farway,

This was a genuine question and i still think that Southsea is not a proper town and has such should'nt have a seperate town listing to Portsmouth.

It may have been a town in henry the 8ths time but many such towns have been incorporated into larger towns or cities.

I was asking this question because i was going to review a pub in Portsmouth or is that Southsea which has no review and no area set for it yet, and i did'nt want to put it in the wrong area.
If you want to put this pub in an area it is the Red,White and Blue i did this pub when it was a Gales tied house and it sold a very good pint of Gales best bitter and HSB.

Cheers still :confused: Alan

Hi Al

I hope I did not give the impression it was not a genuine question. The point made by Nick about Hove is very valid

Ref Red white & blue, it is Eastney, which is part of Southsea. I see you have posted a new pic

The RWB always had a good reputation for beer when a Gales pubs, not been in for years, in fact as it was opposite the Bootneck's [Royal Marine] barracks, definitely one for a skate [sailor] to avoid

The RWB had the Sky Sports / Spanish satellite ruling recently in landlady's favour, although most national news reports have her in Portsmouth, just to really muddy the waters, however the Portsmouth News has it located, correctly, in Southsea

http://www.portsmouth.co.uk/news/local/east-hampshire/landlady_karen_murphy_s_joy_as_she_beats_sky_in_tv _rights_row_1_3117582

[Al 10000]

Given that the main station is called Portsmouth and Southsea, surely that indicates that Southsea is a different place (otherwise it would just be called Portsmouth)?

Hi rpadam it may be a different place but when we walked around Portsmouth or is that southsea we could'nt tell the different between the two.

My original question was why are these two places seperate on pubs galore, when i look at other cities or large towns all the pubs in that area are on the main listing but this does'nt happen for Portsmouth as the two areas on Portsea island have seperate listings.
I am now trying to add all my pictures and reviews of pubs in the Portsmouth / southsea area and i hav'nt got the faintest idea which area these pubs are in.

I was'nt trying to be awkward about this i was just trying to ask for these areas to be easier to understand.

If you take my home city for example there are many towns and suburbs that are not in the city of Nottingham but they are listed on the main Nottingam list.

So back to my original question why is this different for the Portsmouth and southsea areas.

[Old Blue]

So back to my original question why is this different for the Portsmouth and southsea areas.

Hi Al

I think the nub of this is that whatever the historic reasons why people from Southsea don't like being lumped in with Portsmouth, the site takes its postal towns from the Royal Mail and this is the way they've done it, so we have to work with these as they are, or it would be a huge amount of work for Conrad to change it. There's a fair few anomalies I'd ask to change as well, if we could do that. If the practical issue though is that you keep having to come out of one to go into the other, so to speak, it might be easier to navigate via the maps so you don't have to keep doing that, if you see what I mean.

OB

[Al 10000]

Thanks for that one Old Blue,
I was going off the Portsmouth list then going onto the Southsea list which was very frustrating when some of these pubs are quite close to each other, i had'nt thought of looking at the map.

Cheers Alan

[rpadam]

My original question was why are these two places seperate on pubs galore, when i look at other cities or large towns all the pubs in that area are on the main listing but this does'nt happen for Portsmouth as the two areas on Portsea island have seperate listings.
I am now trying to add all my pictures and reviews of pubs in the Portsmouth / southsea area and i hav'nt got the faintest idea which area these pubs are in.

I was'nt trying to be awkward about this i was just trying to ask for these areas to be easier to understand.

If you take my home city for example there are many towns and suburbs that are not in the city of Nottingham but they are listed on the main Nottingam list.

So back to my original question why is this different for the Portsmouth and southsea areas.
Having consulted a Postcode Atlas, I think the answer is this:


Portsmouth is the 'post town' for the PO1, PO2, PO3 and PO6 postcode districts.

Southsea is the 'post town' for the PO4 and PO5 postcode districts.
Therefore, any pub with a postcode beginning PO4 or PO5 will be automatically listed under Southsea rather than Portsmouth.