Editing Lancashire (section)

==Demography==
{{see also|List of settlements in Lancashire by population}}
The major settlements in the ceremonial county are concentrated on [[the Fylde]] coast (the [[Blackpool Urban Area]]), and a number of notable settlements along west to east of the [[M65 motorway|M65]]: including the city of [[Preston, Lancashire|Preston]] and towns of [[Blackburn]], [[Darwen]], [[Accrington]], [[Burnley]], [[Padiham]], [[Brierfield, Lancashire|Brierfield]], [[Nelson, Lancashire|Nelson]] and [[Colne]]. South of Preston are the towns of [[Leyland, Lancashire|Leyland]] and [[Chorley]] (which, with Preston, formed [[Central Lancashire]] New Town designated in 1970), as well as [[Penwortham]], [[Skelmersdale]] and [[Ormskirk]]. 

The north of the county is predominantly rural and sparsely populated, except for the city of [[Lancaster, Lancashire|Lancaster]] and the towns of [[Morecambe]] and [[Heysham]], the three of which form a large conurbation of almost 100,000 people. Lancashire is home to a significant [[British Asian|Asian]] population, numbering over 70,000 and 6% of the county's population, and concentrated largely in the former cotton mill towns in the south east.
{{historical populations|align=none|shading=off|percentages=pagr|cols=3
| title = Population totals within the post-1998 boundaries of the non-metropolitan county
|  1801 |  163,310
|  1811 |  192,283
|  1821 |  236,724
|  1831 |  261,710
|  1841 |  289,925
|  1851 |  313,957
|  1861 |  419,412
|  1871 |  524,869
|  1881 |  630,323
|  1891 |  736,233
|  1901 |  798,545
|  1911 |  873,210
|  1921 |  886,114
|  1931 |  902,965
|  1941 |  922,812
|  1951 |  948,592
|  1961 |  991,648
|  1971 |  1,049,013
|  1981 |  1,076,146
|  1991 |  1,122,097
|  2001 |  1,134,976
|  2011 | 1,171,339
|  footnote = Pre-1998 statistics were gathered from local government areas that now comprise the non-metropolitan county<br />''Source: [[Great Britain Historical GIS]].''<ref>{{cite web|url=http://www.visionofbritain.org.uk/data_cube_page.jsp?data_theme=T_POP&data_cube=N_TOT_POP&u_id=10097848&c_id=10001043&add=N|title=Lancashire Modern (post 1974) County: Total Population|author=A Vision of Britain through time|access-date=10 January 2010|author-link=A Vision of Britain through Time|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20110615005052/http://www.visionofbritain.org.uk/data_cube_page.jsp?data_theme=T_POP&data_cube=N_TOT_POP&u_id=10097848&c_id=10001043&add=N|archive-date=15 June 2011|url-status=live|df=dmy-all}}</ref>
}}