"Reading: England's largest town." a Reading Travel Page by mwe

Of course, Reading is nowhere near the biggest place in England, but it is the biggest TOWN: bigger places are all CITIES.
Reading is not a tourist destination in its own right, but could be used as a tourist base to visit nearby places, as it is located in central southern England.
Central London is 40 miles away (25 minutes by 125 MPH Inter City First Great Western trains). Heathrow Airport is just 25 miles. The port of Southampton is 50 miles away. The nearest seaside is Hayling Island (Hampshire) 60 miles away. Wales (Newport) is 90 miles away.

Most overseas visitors to Reading are likely to be business travellers visiting UK headquarters of various multinationals like Hewlett Packard, Foster Wheeler, Oracle, ING, British Gas E&P, etc. on the varoius business parks located mainly to the south & east of the town.
Other visitors to Reading are likely to be students going to the London Road & Whiteknights campuses of Reading University, to the southeast of the town centre and football supporters going to see their team play Reading's 'Royals' soccer team who were promoted to English top-flight Premiership soccer for the first time in their 135-year history in 2006.

Reading is the nearest big 'provincial' town to the BBC in west London, so Reading sometimes features in 'Fly on the wall' documentaries (which are intended to be a snapshot of the way things are in Britain), such as "The family" in 1974 & "Police" in the early 1980s & they sometimes send reporters out to Reading to get a non-London view on things.

Famous Reading people include Ricky Gervais, Chris Tarrant, Rudolf Walker ("Love thy neighbour" & "EastEnders") & antiques expert, Arthur Negus.

Reading is on the border of 3 ITV regions. Officially it's Meridian, but some parts of Reading can't get Meridian very well & watch London ITV or Central instead.
Reading is lucky enough to receive the best London radio stations such as Magic, Heart, Capital, Kiss & Virgin's FM service & you can also get these stations on DAB in Reading.
Of the Reading-based local stations, I don't know why anyone listens to 2-Ten-FM & Reading 107 when they can clearly receive London stations.
Radio Berkshire is the local BBC station on 104.1 & 104.4FM. Classic Gold has a Reading-based service on 1431 AM (210m MW). Those venturing beyond Ascot can stick with Tony Blackburn by retuning to 828kHz (Bedfordshire Classic Gold).

Until the completion of The Oracle shopping centre in 2000, Reading didn't really made a big thing of its riversides.
Reading has three rivers:
1) The Thames.
Flows across the north of Reading. There are some boatyards & marinas, you can hire boats or do river cruises.
The Warren is probably one of the most exclusive, expensive parts of Reading, big houses on the hill on the north bank look down on the Thames. South bank of the Thames is mostly industrial & the home of the controversial rock festival. Upmarket flats (sorry, apartments) have replaced some of the industry on the south bank of the Thames.
The Thames starts in Gloucestershire, goes down through Oxford, Reading, Henley, Maidenhead, Windsor & Staines, then through Greater London, after which is becomes the Thames estuary (between the counties of Essex & Kent) before going into the North Sea.

2) The Kennet.
Joins the Thames east of Reading town centre (at Kennet Mouth), flows through the east & south of the town centre (past offices, by houses & past The Oracle centre), becoming Reading's southwestern boundary & then going to Newbury, Hungerford & up to its source in Wiltshire's Marlborough Downs.
3) The Loddon.
Flows near & through the southeastern outskirts of Reading from its source in Hampshire. Sindlesham Mill Hotel, just outside Reading is on the Loddon. The George in Woodley is a Loddon-side pub.

Labour-run Reading Borough Council covers most of Reading, except for the suburbs of Earley & Woodley, which are part of Conservative-controlled Wokingham.
Reading Borough's POPULATION is about 144,000 plus the populations of suburbs outsde the borough boundary (Earley, Woodley and Calcot) equals 232,662 people in the built-up area of Reading as you see it on the map.
Up until 1911, everything north of the Thames in the Reading area was Oxfordshire. In 1911, Caversham (the Reading suburb north of the Thames) was moved to Berkshire, like the rest of Reading. A further land -grab happened in the 1970s, when the then new suburb of Caversham Park Village moved from Oxfordshire to Berkshire county.

Reading has 4 MPs. Reading West is Labour (Martin Salter). Reading East is a marginal seat (Conservative since May, 2005). Wokingham (includes southeastern suburbs of Reading) is the man who the press says looks like Spock: John Redwood (Conservative). South Oxfordshire's MP is Boris Johnson (Conservative).

Central Reading (RG1) is essentially Victorian, with a lot of terraced houses. There are five main suburbs in Reading:
Whitley (RG2) is mainly a big post-WW1 council estate, with some grander homes near the University.
Tilehurst (RG3/30) is a diverse former village: mostly 1950s council estates, with the full range of private homes, some posh.

Caversham (RG4) is generally a posh area (e.g. the Heights). Lower Caversham isn't posh (mainly Victorian terraces).

Woodley (RG5) is a former Village with some older cottages, but is mainly private semi's on post-1945 estates.
Earley (RG6) has 3 distinct parts: North Earley is mostly 1930s. South Earley is 1930s on the main roads with 1950s/'60s estates.
Lower Earley is one of the largest private housing developments in western Europe. It's right on the outer edge of Reading, where it goes down to the Loddon. It was started in the second half of the 1970s & was more or less completed during the 1990s & is therefore the biggest example of 1980s housing in Britain. Ironically, some parts of the 'Lower' Earley development are the highest parts of Earley!