Town Twinning

Luton is twinned with five towns in Europe: three in Germany, one in France, and one in Sweden.

The Council, whilst generally supporting the initiatives of local people to hold exchange visits with the residents of the five twin towns, does not give funding to aid such initiatives.

 GERMANY

Wolfsburg

Is the home of the Volkswagen car plant.

A new town which rose in 1938 from the decision to build the Volkswagen factory in Lower Saxony 30 miles from Hanover.

It also is a large agricultural area producing milk, sugar beet and asparagus.

The population is about 140,000. The Volkswagen plant is apparently the biggest in the world and employs over 50,000 people.

Links with Wolfsburg began as long ago as 1950 when Youth Leaders from Wolfsburg visited Luton.

Links have generally been through exchanges of young and elderly persons groups.

Spandau in Zahlen

A town of 220,000 people on the outskirts of Berlin and which has been part of Berlin since 1920.

Links were established in 1959 and have been continued through young and elderly persons exchanges.

Industries include metal working, chemicals and carpet manufacturing.

Bergisch Gladbach

A town of 100,000 in north-west Germany about 15 miles from Cologne.

Twinned with Luton since 1956 its principal industries include paper manufacturing, printing, glassware and textiles.

Links were established with these German towns principally through the enthusiasm of Hedley Lawrence, a leading Councillor of this Borough. In many ways it was a bold initiative coming so soon after the Second World War.

In the 1970s and 1980s there was a great deal of activity between the German towns and Luton including a number of civic visits.

This has reduced greatly during the 1990s and no civic visits have taken place for some time.

FRANCE

Bourgoin Jallieu

A small town of about 25,000 people in south-east France between Lyons and the French Alps.

Twinned with Luton in 1956 it has a very small amount of manufacturing industry allied to the silk trade, specialising in engraving for textile prints and silk weaving.

Luton twinned with Bourgoin at the same time as twinning with Bergisch Gladbach. Those 2 towns were already twinned and it seems that when we twinned with one the other was included.

Links include sporting exchanges (rugby) and students on work/college exchanges.

SWEDEN

Eskilstuna

Population of 92,000 and situated on the River Eskilstunaan about 70 miles west of Stockholm.

Twinned with Luton since 1949 its largest industry is the manufacture of heavy construction plant, tractors and dump trucks.

Links have generally been around school choirs and orchestras.