As Mayor of Sunderland I am very proud to represent a city with such a rich cultural heritage, and ambitious, exciting plans for its future which includes our bid to become UK City of Culture 2021.
I’m already looking forward to our city celebrating our maritime heritage when Sunderland hosts the Tall Ships in 2018. My father worked at JL Thompson’s shipyards, and it will be great to see thousands of visitors along the same stretch of river where I used to watch the men working building ships for the world not so many years ago in the shadow of where the National Glass Centre now stands.
Our bid for UK City of Culture represents an even wider opportunity to share what makes this city so special with the rest of the country. We are a home for world class sports and entertainment, and host some of the largest and most popular outdoor events in Europe including the annual Sunderland International Airshow with our miles of green open spaces and coastline.
Sunderland has fantastic venues such as the Stadium of Light and Empire Theatre, and creating new ones as part of our continuing regeneration of the city centre and seafront to provide even more leisure and recreational attractions for residents and visitors alike to enjoy.
I’m one of the tens of thousands who pack into the stadium on match days, and also a regular member of the audience enjoying one of the West End shows at the Empire, which both attract people from all over the country and indeed the world into Sunderland every year.
We are a city which prides itself on its hospitality with international friendship agreements with Washington DC and Harbin and twin cities across Europe, and provide a home for global companies and overseas students alike.
Our city has also created historic iconic landmarks such as Washington Old Hall, Penshaw Monument and Hylton Castle, and cultural landmarks in world history through literary and religious scholars such Benedict Biscop and Bede.
Fantastic developments such as the new Wear Crossing and the continuing regeneration of the city centre point towards a bright future, and becoming UK City Of Culture in 2021 would help us celebrate that and share Sunderland’s continuing cultural legacy with the rest of the country.
It would mean so much to so many people in our community, people fiercely proud of our city and our rich cultural heritage and sporting, local traditions to achieve this status.
I am extremely proud of our city and honoured to have represented its people as Mayor. The bid is capturing people’s imagination and I hope that working together with local residents, businesses and our regional cultural partners we can achieve our ambition to become UK City of Culture 2021.
— The Right Worshipful the Mayor of the city of Sunderland, Councillor Alan Emerson
