134-554: Metro-land (or Metroland – see note on spelling, below) is a name given to the suburban areas that were built to the north-west of London in the counties of Buckinghamshire , Hertfordshire and Middlesex in the early part of the 20th century that were served by the Metropolitan Railway ((also known as the Met )). The railway company was in the privileged position of being allowed to retain surplus land; from 1919 this
268-512: A Jubilee line tube station and accompanying shopping district on the western side. The postal district is NW9 which it shares with Colindale and West Hendon . The name Kingsbury means "The King's fortification". Kingsbury was an ancient parish of a fairly modest 6.9 square kilometres (2.7 sq mi) in the Hundred of Gore and county of Middlesex . Following local government redrawing of electoral wards Kingsbury corresponds to
402-572: A " neighborhood " in the U.S. Due in part to historical trends such as white flight , some suburbs in the United States have a higher population and higher incomes than their nearby inner cities. In some countries, including India, China, New Zealand, Canada, the United Kingdom, and parts of the United States, new suburbs are routinely annexed by adjacent cities due to urban sprawl . In others, such as Morocco , France, and much of
536-525: A belief summed up in a housing poster of the period "you cannot expect to get an A1 population out of C3 homes" – referring to military fitness classifications of the period. The committee's report of 1917 was taken up by the government, which passed the Housing, Town Planning, &c. Act 1919 , also known as the Addison Act after Christopher Addison , the then Minister for Housing. The Act allowed for
670-522: A city or town or to a separate municipality or unincorporated area outside a town or city. Although a majority of Americans regard themselves as residents of suburban communities, the federal government of the United States has no formal definition for what constitutes a suburb in the United States, leaving its precise meaning disputed. In Canada, the term may also be used in the British sense, especially as cities annex formerly outlying areas. In
804-550: A city's expansion, such as Ealing , Bromley , and Guiseley . In Ireland, this can be seen in the Dublin suburban areas of Swords, Blanchardstown , and Tallaght . The history of suburbia is part of the study of urban history , which focuses on the origins, growth, diverse typologies, culture, and politics of suburbs, as well as on the gendered and family-oriented nature of suburban space. Many people have assumed that early-20th-century suburbs were enclaves for middle-class whites,
938-404: A component of these newly designed suburbs which were booming in population. The television helped contribute to the rise of shopping centers by allowing for additional advertisement through the medium in addition to creating a desire among consumers to buy products that are shown being used in suburban life on various television programs. Another factor that led to the rise of these shopping centers
1072-479: A concept that carries tremendous cultural influence yet is actually stereotypical. Some suburbs are based on a society of working-class and minority residents, many of whom want to own their own house. Meanwhile, other suburbs instituted "explicitly racist" policies to deter people deemed as "other", a practice most common in the United States in contrast to other countries around the world. Mary Corbin Sies argues that it
1206-475: A few minutes journey of it. Over the years during which the guide was published, large numbers of Londoners moved out to the new estates in north-west London. Some of these estates were developed by MRCE, a company that Robert H. Selbie, the Metropolitan Railway's General Manager, set up in 1919. It would eventually build houses along the line, from Neasden reaching far out as Amersham. One of
1340-603: A fish pond, and a farm, and adjoins Barn Hill to the south. The centre of Kingsbury Green which is today around the Kingsbury Road/Church Lane crossing was historically the centre of Kingsbury in the 15th century, built 1 mile north from the former settlement at Blackbird Hill. To its south, Church Lane leads to the St Andrew's parish church, built in 1933. In Slough Lane and Buck Lane there exist 1920s timbered houses designed by Ernest Trowbridge . On
1474-565: A further distance from them. In Japan, the construction of suburbs has boomed since the end of World War II and many cities are experiencing the urban sprawl effect. In Mexico, suburbs are generally similar to their United States counterparts. Houses are made in many different architectural styles which may be of European, American and International architecture and which vary in size. Suburbs can be found in Guadalajara , Mexico City, Monterrey , and most major cities. Lomas de Chapultepec
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#17327729138481608-1015: A high of nearly two-thirds of Calgary CMA residents (67%), to a low of about one-third of Montréal CMA residents (34%). Large cities in Canada acquired streetcar suburbs in the late 19th and early 20th centuries. Modern Canadian suburbs tend to be less automobile-centric than those in the United States, and public transit use is encouraged but can be notably unused. Throughout Canada, there are comprehensive plans in place to curb sprawl. Population and income growth in Canadian suburbs had tended to outpace growth in core urban or rural areas, but in many areas, this trend has now reversed. The suburban population increased by 87% between 1981 and 2001, well ahead of urban growth. The majority of recent population growth in Canada's three largest metropolitan areas ( Greater Toronto , Greater Montréal, and Greater Vancouver ) has occurred in non-core municipalities. This trend
1742-540: A hundred Englishmen an appeal which cannot be explained away as some strange instance of mass aberration", he was, in his own words, "scorned by my contemporaries as either an irrelevant eccentricity or a betrayal of the forward looking views of the Modern Movement". John Betjeman admired John Piper 's illustrations for Castles on the Ground , describing the "fake half-timber, the leaded lights and bow windows of
1876-588: A large scale in the 19th and 20th centuries, as a result of improved rail and road transport, which led to an increase in commuting. In general, they are less densely populated than inner city neighborhoods within the same metropolitan area, and most residents routinely commute to city centers or business districts via private vehicles or public transits ; however, there are many exceptions, including industrial suburbs , planned communities , and satellite cities . Suburbs tend to proliferate around cities that have an abundance of adjacent flat land. The English word
2010-476: A large stand–alone house. In the suburbs, where stand–alone houses are the rule, lots may be 85 feet (26 m) wide by 115 feet (35 m) deep, as in the Chicago suburb of Naperville . Manufacturing and commercial buildings were segregated in other areas of the city. Alongside suburbanization, many companies began locating their offices and other facilities in the outer areas of the cities, which resulted in
2144-558: A meeting point for those who lived within suburban America at this time. These centers thrived offering goods and services to the growing populations in suburban America. In 1957, 940 shopping centers were built and this number more than doubled by 1960 to keep up with the demand of these densely populated areas. Very little housing had been built during the Great Depression and World War II , except for emergency quarters near war industries. Overcrowded and inadequate apartments
2278-435: A modern home in beautiful countryside with a fast railway-service to central London. By 1915 people from across London had flocked to live the new suburban dream in large newly built areas across north-west London. Suburbanization in the interwar period was heavily influenced by the garden city movement of Ebenezer Howard and the creation of the first garden suburbs at the turn of the 20th century. The first garden suburb
2412-512: A phenomenon known as white flight . After World War II, the availability of FHA loans stimulated a housing boom in American suburbs. In the older cities of the northeast U.S., streetcar suburbs originally developed along train or trolley lines that could shuttle workers into and out of city centers where the jobs were located. This practice gave rise to the term " bedroom community ", meaning that most daytime business activity took place in
2546-435: A problem of public order (keeping the unwelcome poorest classes together with the criminals, in this way better controlled, comfortably remote from the elegant "official" town). On the other hand, the expected huge expansion of the town soon effectively covered the distance from the central town, and now those suburbs are completely engulfed by the main territory of the town. Other newer suburbs (called exurbs ) were created at
2680-473: A settled life moved in masses to the suburbs. Levittown developed as a major prototype of mass-produced housing. Due to the influx of people in these suburban areas, the amount of shopping centers began to increase as suburban America took shape. These malls helped supply goods and services to the growing urban population. Shopping for different goods and services in one central location without having to travel to multiple locations, helped to keep shopping centers
2814-618: A stockbroker or a lawyer's wife ... you could perhaps afford a new Tudorbethan mansion, with an oak staircase and mullioned windows and half-timbered gables, in Godalming or Esher, or Amersham or Penn". Of the surrounding landscape, Country Life itself has observed that, in its early days, it offered a rose-tinted view of the English countryside ... idyllic villages, vernacular buildings and already dying rural crafts. All were illustrated with hauntingly beautiful photographs. They portrayed
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#17327729138482948-744: A thegn of the Confessor , and passed from him to Ernulf of Hesdin who died in 1097 and his lands passed to the family of Walter of Salisbury. Thereafter the overlordship of Kingsbury descended with Edgware manor. By 1086 on the Domesday survey of property, Ernulf's manor in Kingsbury had been subinfeudated to Albold as Lord. It was not mentioned again until 1317, when, under the name of the manor of Kingsbury, it belonged to Baldwin Poleyn of Tebworth . Kingsbury developed little in housing and population in
3082-578: A total price of $ 10,000. Veterans could get one with a much lower down payment. At the same time, African Americans were rapidly moving north and west for better jobs and educational opportunities than were available to them in the segregated South. Their arrival in Northern and Western cities en masse, in addition to being followed by race riots in several large cities such as Philadelphia , Los Angeles , Detroit , Chicago , and Washington, D.C. , further stimulated white suburban migration. The growth of
3216-402: A utopian never-never world of peace and plenty in a pre-industrial Britain. By the 1930s the availability of mortgages with an average rate of interest of 4 1 ⁄ 4 per cent meant that private housing was well within the range of most middle class and many working-class pockets. This was a potent factor in the growth of Metro-land: for example, in the first three decades of the 20th century
3350-615: Is a distinct European style originating from European influence during the mid-1600s when the Dutch settled the Cape. Houses like these are called Cape Dutch Houses and can be found in the affluent suburbs of Constantia and Bishopscourt . Large cities like Sydney and Melbourne had streetcar suburbs in the tram era. With the automobile, the Australian usage came about as outer areas were quickly surrounded in fast-growing cities, but retained
3484-599: Is a district of northwest London in the London Borough of Brent . Its ancient scope stretches to include various distinct areas that were once small villages until the inter-war period. Kingsbury was in 2001 a ward and in 2011 was identifiable with the Fryent and Barnhill wards approximately. Today it forms a quiet suburb between Fryent Country Park to the west and the Brent Reservoir to the east, along with
3618-550: Is also beginning to take effect in Vancouver , and to a lesser extent, Montréal . In certain cities, particularly Edmonton and Calgary , suburban growth takes place within the city boundaries as opposed to in bedroom communities. This is due to annexation and a large geographic footprint within the city borders. Calgary is unusual among Canadian cities because it has developed as a unicity – it has annexed most of its surrounding towns and large amounts of undeveloped land around
3752-954: Is an example of an affluent suburb, although it is located inside the city and by no means is today a suburb in the strict sense of the word. In other countries, the situation is similar to that of Mexico, with many suburbs being built, most notably in Peru and Chile, which have experienced a boom in the construction of suburbs since the late 1970s and early 1980s. As the growth of middle-class and upper-class suburbs increased, low-class squatter areas have increased, most notably "lost cities" in Mexico, campamentos in Chile, barriadas in Peru, villa miserias in Argentina, asentamientos in Guatemala and favelas of Brazil. Kingsbury, London Kingsbury
3886-441: Is an urbanized nation where over 80% of the population lives in urban areas (loosely defined), and roughly two-thirds live in one of Canada's 33 census metropolitan areas (CMAs) with a population of over 100,000. However, of this metropolitan population, in 2001 nearly half lived in low-density neighborhoods, with only one in five living in a typical "urban" neighborhood. The percentage living in low-density neighborhoods varied from
4020-549: Is applied to suburban areas around the route of the Metropolitan Railway, areas which urbanised under the influence of the railway in the 20th century. It applies to land in Middlesex, west Hertfordshire and south Buckinghamshire. The Middlesex area is now administered as the London Boroughs of Brent and Harrow , together with part of the London Borough of Hillingdon . The architect Hugh Casson regarded Harrow as
4154-789: Is derived from the Old French subburbe , which is in turn derived from the Latin suburbium , formed from sub (meaning "under" or "below") and urbs ("city"). The first recorded use of the term in English according to the Oxford English Dictionary appears in Middle English c. 1350 in the manuscript of the Midlands Prose Psalter, in which the form suburbes is used. In Australia, New Zealand, and South Africa, suburban areas (in
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4288-720: Is much like another in an atomised society. Rarely does community flourish", while the American Lewis Mumford , wrote in the New Yorker in 1953 that "monotony and suburbanism" were the result of the "unimaginative" design of Britain's post-war New Towns . When the editor of the Architectural Review , J. M. Richards , wrote in The Castles on the Ground (1946) that "for all the alleged deficiencies of suburban taste ... it holds for ninety out of
4422-407: Is necessary to examine how "suburb" is defined as well as the distinction made between cities and suburbs, geography, economic circumstances, and the interaction of numerous factors that move research beyond acceptance of stereotyping and its influence on scholarly assumptions. The earliest appearance of suburbs coincided with the spread of the first urban settlements. Large walled towns tended to be
4556-544: The Inner Circle in 1884, but the most important route became the line north into the Middlesex countryside, where it stimulated the development of new suburbs. Harrow was reached in 1880, and the line eventually extended as far as Verney Junction in Buckinghamshire , more than 50 miles (80 kilometres) from Baker Street and the centre of London. From the end of the 19th century, the railway shared tracks with
4690-556: The Buckinghamshire Railway Centre . Lycett Green noted of the planning of this trip that among the fine details considered were which filling to have in the baguettes on the train through Metro-land and how long it would stop on the track so that the poem "Middlesex" could be read over the tannoy. The event was in the tradition of earlier commemorations of "Metro-land", such as a centenary parade of rolling stock at Neasden in 1963 and celebrations in 2004 to mark
4824-666: The English Electric album. It was released as a single, with the video showing the singer dreamily gazing out from a train at an idealised suburban landscape. In 1903 the Metropolitan developed a housing estate at Cecil Park, Pinner , the first of many such enterprises over the next thirty years. Overseen by the Metropolitan's general manager from 1908 to 1930, Robert H Selbie, the railway formed its own Country Estates Company in 1919. The slogan, "Live in Metro-land",
4958-580: The FNB ("Soccer City") Stadium and south of the city in areas like Eikenhof, where the "Eye of Africa" planned community exists. This master-planned community is nearly indistinguishable from the most amenity-rich resort-style American suburbs in Florida, Arizona, and California, complete with a golf course, resort pool, equestrian facility , 24-hour staffed gates, gym, and BMX track, as well as several tennis, basketball, and volleyball courts. In Cape Town, there
5092-557: The Great Central Railway route out of Marylebone . Electric traction was introduced in 1905 with electric multiple units operating services between Uxbridge, Harrow-on-the-Hill and Baker Street. To remove steam and smoke from the tunnels in central London, the Metropolitan Railway purchased electric locomotives , and these were exchanged for steam locomotives on trains at Harrow from 1908. To improve services, more powerful electric and steam locomotives were purchased in
5226-673: The Hampstead Garden Suburb . The suburb attracted the talents of architects including Raymond Unwin and Sir Edwin Lutyens , and it ultimately grew to encompass over 800 acres. During World War I, the Tudor Walters Committee was commissioned to make recommendations for the post war reconstruction and housebuilding. In part, this was a response to the shocking lack of fitness amongst many recruits during World War One, attributed to poor living conditions;
5360-844: The London Passenger Transport Board (LPTB), and the railway became the Metropolitan line of London Transport. The LPTB was not interested in running goods and freight services and the London and North Eastern Railway (LNER) took over all freight traffic. At the same time the LNER became responsible for hauling passenger trains with steam locomotives north of Rickmansworth. The lines north of Aylesbury to Verney Junction and Brill were closed; last train to Brill ran on 30 November 1935 and to Quainton Road and Verney Junction on 2 April 1936. Quainton Road continued to be served by
5494-486: The United Synagogue is first recorded in Kingsbury in 1939. In 1942 Eden Lodge at Kingsbury Green was registered for worship, becoming Kingsbury district synagogue in 1954. In 1894, the area of the medieval ancient parish of Kingsbury was included in the urban district of Wembley . However, as Kingsbury had only three councillors on the urban district council to Wembley's nine, Kingsbury's councillors felt
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5628-465: The Welsh Harp to its east and has a road crossing the reservoir towards West Hendon . This part in the south retains traces of the district's quiet, wooded appearance. The Roe Green Garden Village is located to the east of Roe Green Park . In 1968 the area became a conservation area and it retains the atmosphere of a historic village green. The garden suburb estate was originally built during
5762-614: The Wycombes are not in Metro-land". The usefulness of the term Metro-land , has occasionally led journalists to use the term for the suburban catchment of other underground lines. The Metropolitan's terminus at Baker Street was "the gateway to Metro-land" and Chiltern Court, which opened over the station in 1929 and was headquarters during the Second World War of the Special Operations Executive ,
5896-403: The inner cities of the U.S. Examples include the banlieues of France, or the concrete suburbs of Sweden, even if the suburbs of these countries also include middle-class and upper-class neighborhoods that often consist of single-family houses . Following the growth of the middle class due to African industrialization, the development of middle class suburbs has boomed since the beginning of
6030-571: The "Rambleland" stations of Surrey and Sussex. The sentimental and somewhat archaic prose of the Metro-land guide ("the Roman road aslant the eastern border ... the innumerable field-paths which mark the labourer's daily route from hamlet to farm") conjured up a rustic Eden – a Middle England , perhaps – similar to that invoked by Stanley Baldwin (Prime Minister three times between 1923 and 1937) who, though of manufacturing stock, famously donned
6164-567: The "capital city" of Metro-land, while Arthur Mee 's King's England described Wembley as its "epitome". The Metro-land guide insisted that Metro-land was "a country with elastic borders that each visitor can draw for himself". Even so, Metro-land was quite firm that, so far as the Buckinghamshire Chilterns were concerned, its "Grand Duchy" was confined to the hundred of Burnham : "the Chilterns round Marlow and
6298-493: The 1850s and eventually became a component of the Australian Dream . Toward the end of the century, with the development of public transit systems such as the underground railways , trams and buses, it became possible for the majority of a city's population to reside outside the city and to commute into the center for work. By the mid-19th century, the first major suburban areas were springing up around London as
6432-695: The 1920s, the word was so ingrained in the consciousness that, in Evelyn Waugh ’s novel, Decline and Fall (1928), the Hon Margot Beste-Chetwynde took Viscount Metroland as her second husband. Lady Metroland's second appearance in Vile Bodies in 1930 and A Handful of Dust in 1934 further reinforces this. Metro-land further entered the public psyche with the song My Little Metro-land Home (lyrics by Boyle Lawrence and music by Henry Thraile, 1920), while another ditty extolled
6566-460: The 1920s. A short branch opened from Rickmansworth to Watford in 1925. The 4-mile (6.4 km) long Stanmore branch from Wembley Park was completed in 1932. Unlike other railway companies, which were required to dispose of surplus land, the Met was in a privileged position with clauses in its acts allowing it to retain land that it believed was necessary for future railway use. Initially the surplus land
6700-603: The 1930s through 1945, there were 1,450,000 constructed annually from 1946 through 1955. The G.I. Bill guaranteed low-cost loans for veterans, with very low down payments, and low interest rates. With 16 million eligible veterans, the opportunity to buy a house was suddenly at hand. In 1947 alone, 540,000 veterans bought one; their average price was $ 7300. The construction industry kept prices low by standardization—for example, standardizing sizes for kitchen cabinets, refrigerators and stoves allowed for mass production of kitchen furnishings. Developers purchased empty land just outside
6834-434: The 1990s, particularly in cities such as Cairo , Nairobi , Johannesburg , and Lagos . In an illustrative case of South Africa, RDP housing has been built. In much of Soweto , many houses are American in appearance, but are smaller, and often consist of a kitchen and living room, two or three bedrooms, and a bathroom. However, there are more affluent neighborhoods, more comparable to American suburbs, particularly east of
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#17327729138486968-475: The 19th century, remaining a polyfocal village . In this age, Oliver Goldsmith , writer and playwright, lived at Hyde Farm, Kingsbury (1771–1774); the third Lord Mansfield was buried at St. Andrew 's churchyard in 1840. Although it lay close to London, development started slowly, and it was not until after the First World War that the district became built up. An aircraft industry was established in
7102-554: The Barnhill Conservation Group. Blackbird Hill is the ancient centre of Kingsbury which is today the very southern end of the district, separating west–east Wembley Park and Neasden . Today it is an important road that connects various suburbs in and around Kingsbury and Wembley to the North Circular Road . Little remains of the medieval village: the southern part was redeveloped into shops in
7236-561: The Englishman's castle" as "the beauty of the despised, patronised suburb". However, as the historian David Kynaston observed sixty years later, "the time was far from ripe for Metroland nostalgia". Valerie Grove , who conceded that Metro-land was "a kinder word than 'suburbia'" and referred to the less spoilt areas beyond Rickmansworth as "Outer Metro-land", maintained that "suburbia had no visible history. Anyone with any spirit ... had to get out of Metro-land to make their mark". Thus,
7370-473: The First World War for workers at the nearby Aircraft Manufacturing Company . The rest of the area was opened up by the early 1930s. The area is next to a previous medieval village called Roe Green, at the junctions of Stag Lane, Hay Lane and Bacon Lane, of which little remains. The Kingsbury Manor in Roe Green Park, built in 1899, is today Grade II listed. Roe Green Park is community maintained by
7504-538: The Fryent and Barnhill wards and in all of its various older guises, a minority or all of the Queensbury ward. The early English kings had parted with their manor of Kingsbury long before the Conquest . An estate called Tunworth, in the northern part of Kingsbury parish, was granted by Edwy to his thegn Lyfing in 957. By 1066 it probably formed part of the manor of Kingsbury, which was then held by Wlward White,
7638-678: The Fryent ward's largest ethnic group was Indian at 21%. Whites as a whole form 34% (20% Black Caribbean, 14% Other, 6% Black African). 11% was Other Asian. 41% were Christian, 21% Muslim and 20% Hindu. The Welsh Harp ward, which covers southern areas of Kingsbury Green, was 17% White Other, 17% Indian, and 16% White British. The first two series of BBC children's drama Grange Hill were filmed at Kingsbury High School . Video of "Round Here ", about George Michael 's childhood, features Roe Green Park, Roe Green Primary School and other local landmarks. Much of Kingsbury lies between 148 feet (45 m) and 200 feet (60 m) above sea level. A part at
7772-592: The Grand Central Terminal commuter hub that enabled its development. Westchester's true importance in the history of American suburbanization derives from the upper-middle class development of villages including Scarsdale , New Rochelle and Rye serving thousands of businessmen and executives from Manhattan. The suburban population in North America exploded during the post-World War II economic expansion . Returning veterans wishing to start
7906-725: The Kingsbury Urban District was abolished and merged once more in Wembley Urban District. The urban district became a municipal borough in 1937 and in 1965 the area became part of the London Borough of Brent. Kingsbury tube station on the Jubilee line is located in the western part of the district. This part of the road with an urban atmosphere contains supermarkets, banks, Arabic and Indian food and vegetable shops, and other businesses for
8040-629: The LNER. For a time, the LPTB used the "Metro-land" tag: "Cheap fares to Metro-land and the sea" were advertised in 1934 but the "Metro-land" brand was rapidly dropped. London Transport introduced new slogans such as "Away by Metropolitan" and "Good spot, the Chilterns". Steam traction continued to be used on the outer sections of what had become the " Metropolitan line " until 1961. From that date Metropolitan trains ran only as far as Amersham , with main line services from Marylebone covering stations between Great Missenden and Aylesbury. The term Metro-land
8174-499: The Met had authority to hold land, it had none to develop it, so an independent company was created, although all but one of its directors were also directors of the railway company. The MRCE went on to develop estates at Kingsbury Garden Village near Neasden , Wembley Park , Cecil Park and Grange Estate at Pinner and the Cedars Estate at Rickmansworth and create places such as Harrow Garden Village . The term Metro-land
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#17327729138488308-551: The Met's architect Charles W. Clark, who was also responsible for the design of a number of station reconstructions in outer "Metro-land" at this time. A few large houses had been built on parts of Wembley Park , south-west of the Metropolitan station, as early as the 1890s. In 1906, when Watkin ’s Tower closed, the Tower Company had become the Wembley Park Estate Company (later Wembley Ltd.), with
8442-491: The Metropolitan Railway's publicity department had created the term Metro-land. It was used as the new name for the company's annual guide to the places it served (known as Guide to the Extension Line prior to 1915). The Metro-land guide, although partly written to attract walkers and day trippers, was clearly primarily intended to encourage the building of suburban homes and create middle-class commuters who would use
8576-458: The Metropolitan Railway's trains for all their needs. It was published annually until 1932, but when the Metropolitan became part of London Transport in 1933 the term and guide were abandoned. By then North-West London was well on the road to its reputation for suburbanisation. The 1924 Metro-land guide describes Wembley Park as "rapidly developed of recent years as a residential district", pointing out that there are several golf courses within
8710-704: The Metropolitan for illicit excursions to night clubs in London: "Whenever the police raided the Hypocrites' Club or the Coconut Club, the '43 or the Blue Lantern there would always be Harrovians there". Suburban A suburb (more broadly suburban area ) is an area within a metropolitan area which is predominantly residential and within commuting distance of a large city. Suburbs can have their own political or legal jurisdictions, especially in
8844-405: The Metropolitan line to and from London. During a French lesson, Christopher declared, " J’habite Metroland " ["I live in Metroland"], because it "sounds better than Eastwick [the fictional location of his home], stranger than Middlesex". In real life, some schoolboys had made similar journeys for more hedonistic reasons. Betjeman recalled that, between the wars, boys from Harrow School had used
8978-419: The Silver Jubilee Park. Next to the park is a large mandir complex including offices that opened in 2014 and combines Indian architecture with eco friendly technology. The community of the mandir moved over from a previous site located in Golders Green . Kingsbury has large Asian and Irish communities. The local crime rate is average to below-average compared to London overall. The 2011 census showed that
9112-476: The U.S., the development of the skyscraper and the sharp inflation of downtown real estate prices also led to downtowns being more fully dedicated to businesses, thus pushing residents outside the city center. While suburbs are often associated with the middle classes, in many parts of the developed world, suburbs can be economically distressed areas, inhabited by higher proportions of recent immigrants, with higher delinquency rates and social problems, reminiscent of
9246-440: The United Kingdom and Ireland, the term suburb simply refers to a residential area outside the city center, regardless of administrative boundaries. Suburbs, in this sense, can range from areas that seem more like residential areas of a city proper to areas separated by open countryside from the city center. In large cities such as London and Leeds, many suburbs are formerly separate towns and villages that have been absorbed during
9380-435: The United Kingdom to Berlin , Germany were transmitted from the stable block of Kingsbury Manor; this later housed the Veterans Club, and is now a children's nursery. From 1923 to 1979 Kingsbury Road was the location of the Vanden Plas specialist motor body works, body makers for Bentley and later part of Austin , BMC , and British Leyland . The site is now Kingsbury Trading Estate. A congregation of Jews affiliated to
9514-399: The United States, but this is not always the case, especially in the United Kingdom, where most suburbs are located within the administrative boundaries of cities. In most English-speaking countries , suburban areas are defined in contrast to central city or inner city areas, but in Australian English and South African English , suburb has become largely synonymous with what is called
9648-468: The United States, many suburbs remain separate municipalities or are governed locally as part of a larger metropolitan area such as a county, district or borough . In the United States, regions beyond the suburbs are known as "exurban areas" or exurbs ; exurbs have less population density than suburbs, but still more than rural areas. Suburbs and exurbs are sometimes linked to the nearby city economically, particularly by commuters. Suburbs first emerged on
9782-541: The aim of developing Wembley as a residential suburb. Unlike other railways, from an early date the Metropolitan Railway had bought land alongside its line and then developed housing on it. In the 1880s and 1890s it had done so with the Willesden Park Estate near Willesden Green station, and in the early 1900s it developed on land in Pinner, as well as planning the expansion of Wembley Park . In 1915 by
9916-802: The appellation suburb ; the term was eventually applied to neighborhoods in the original core as well. In Australia, Sydney's urban sprawl has occurred predominantly in the Western Suburbs . The locality of Olympic Park was designated an official suburb in 2009. Bangladesh has multiple suburbs, Uttara & Ashulia to name a few. However, most suburbs in Dhaka are different from the ones in Europe & Americas . Most suburbs in Bangladesh are filled with high-rise buildings, paddy fields, and farms, and are designed more like rural villages. Canada
10050-462: The area when houses had been built to accommodate them. Between 1921 and 1928 season ticket sales at Wembley Park and neighbouring Metropolitan stations rose by over 700%. Like the rest of West London, most of Wembley Park and its environs was fully developed, largely with relatively low-density suburban housing, by 1939. On 1 July 1933 the Metropolitan Railway amalgamated with other Underground railways, tramway companies and bus operators to form
10184-501: The building of large new housing estates in the suburbs after the First World War , and marked the start of a long 20th century tradition of state-owned housing, which would later evolve into council estates . The Report also legislated on the required, minimum standards necessary for further suburban construction; this included regulation on the maximum housing density and their arrangement, and it even made recommendations on
10318-742: The centenary of the Uxbridge branch. Metro-land (notably west Hertfordshire) formed the backdrop for the 1960s ABC TV series The Avengers , whose popular imagery was deployed with a twist of fantasy. The archetypal Metro-land subjects (such as the railway station and the quiet suburb) became the settings for fiendish plots and treachery in this series and others, such as The Saint , The Baron and Randall and Hopkirk (Deceased) , all of which made regular use of locations within easy reach of film studios at Borehamwood and Pinewood . Some abhorred Metro-land for its predictability and sameness. A. N. Wilson observed that, although semi-detached dwellings of
10452-457: The central character of Metroland (1980), a novel by Julian Barnes (born 1946) that was filmed in 1997 , ended up in Paris during the disturbances of May 1968 – though, by the late 1970s, having thrown off the yearnings of his youth, he was back in Metro-land. Metroland recounted the essence of suburbia in the early 1960s and the features of daily travel by a schoolboy, Christopher Lloyd, on
10586-476: The city (then the largest in the world) became more overcrowded and unsanitary. A major catalyst for suburban growth was the opening of the Metropolitan Railway in the 1860s. The line later joined the capital's financial heart in the City to what were to become the suburbs of Middlesex . The line reached Harrow in 1880. Unlike other railway companies, which were required to dispose of surplus land, London's Met
10720-472: The city, installed tract houses based on a handful of designs, and provided streets and utilities, while local public officials raced to build schools. The most famous development was Levittown, in Long Island just east of New York City. It offered a new house for $ 1000 down and $ 70 a month; it featured three bedrooms, a fireplace, a gas range and gas furnace, and a landscaped lot of 75 by 100 feet, all for
10854-717: The city, with the working population leaving the city at night for the purpose of going home to sleep. Economic growth in the United States encouraged the suburbanization of American cities that required massive investments for the new infrastructure and homes. Consumer patterns were also shifting at this time, as purchasing power was becoming stronger and more accessible to a wider range of families. Suburban houses also brought about needs for products that were not needed in urban neighborhoods, such as lawnmowers and automobiles. During this time commercial shopping malls were being developed near suburbs to satisfy consumers' needs and their car–dependent lifestyle. Zoning laws also contributed to
10988-588: The city. As a result, most of the communities that Calgarians refer to as "suburbs" are actually inside the city limits. In the 2016 census, the City of Calgary had a population of 1,239,220, whereas the Calgary Metropolitan Area had a population of 1,392,609, indicating the vast majority of people in the Calgary CMA lived within the city limits. The perceived low population density of Calgary largely results from its many internal suburbs and
11122-408: The earliest of these MRCE developments was a 123-acre one at Chalkhill, within the bounds of what was Repton ’s Wembley Park . MRCE acquired the land shortly after it was created and began selling plots in 1921. The railway even put in a siding to bring building materials to the estate. The term ‘Metroland’ (often seen now without the hyphen - see Note on spelling , below) has become shorthand for
11256-541: The early 20th century that had been brought within easy reach of London by the railways, "merely ended up creating an endless ribbon ... not perhaps either town or country". In the process, despite Metro-land' s promotion of rusticity, a number of outlying towns and villages were "swallowed up and lost their identity". Wilson noted that the magazine Country Life , which had been founded by Edward Hudson as Country Life Illustrated in 1897, had influenced this pattern with its advertisements for country houses: "If you were
11390-617: The east side of the green is the Kingsbury Trading Estate, which formerly housed a United Dairies depot. This area was once an aerodrome run by the Barningham brothers under their company Kingsbury Aviation , until the 1920s. Afterwards the site was taken by Vanden Plas . The Kingsbury Works site continued manufacturing vehicles until it closed in 1979. On the west side of the green lies Kingsbury Synagogue . Fryent (between Kingsbury Green and Blackbird Hill) meets
11524-460: The era, was heavily influenced by the Art Deco movement, taking influence from Tudor Revival , chalet style , and even ship design. Within just a decade suburbs dramatically increased in size. Harrow Weald went from just 1,500 to over 10,000 while Pinner jumped from 3,000 to over 20,000. During the 1930s, over 4 million new suburban houses were built, the 'suburban revolution' had made England
11658-712: The existing parish church, built in 1884, dedicated to the Holy Innocents, and adjacent to the more historic Old St Andrew's church , became too small. It was replaced during the 1930s. The current church, completed to designs by Samuel Daukes in 1847, had originally been constructed in Wells Street in central London but after its use declined it was deconstructed, transported and rebuilt (by Holland, Hannen & Cubitts , directed by architect William Adam Forsyth) in its entirety in Kingsbury in 1933–34. John Logie Baird 's experimental television transmissions from
11792-561: The first suburban districts sprung up around downtowns to accommodate those who wanted to escape the squalid conditions of the industrial towns. Initially, such growth came along rail lines in the form of ribbon developments , as suburban residents could commute via train to downtown for work. In Australia, where Melbourne would soon become the second-largest city in the British Empire, the distinctively Australasian suburb, with its loosely aggregated quarter-acre sections, developed in
11926-520: The focus around which smaller villages grew up in a symbiotic relationship with the market town . The word suburbani was first employed by the Roman statesman Cicero in reference to the large villas and estates built by the wealthy patricians of Rome on the city's outskirts. Towards the end of the Eastern Han Dynasty , until 190 AD, when Dong Zhuo razed the city, the capital Luoyang
12060-415: The foot of Fryent Country Park peaks at 213 feet (65 m) and the northern tip of Silver Jubilee Park peaks at an elevation of 233 feet (71 m). Roe Green Garden Village is particularly steep; the area here peaks at an elevation of 302 feet (92 m) near the crossing of Buck Lane and Wakemans Hill Avenue. Kingsbury Road A4006 is the largest road within the district. Fryent Way A4140 cuts through
12194-499: The ideal number of bedrooms and other rooms per house. Although the semi-detached house was first designed by the Shaws (a father and son architectural partnership) in the 19th century, it was during the suburban housing boom of the interwar period that the design first proliferated as a suburban icon, being preferred by middle-class home owners to the smaller terraced houses . The design of many of these houses, highly characteristic of
12328-417: The increased density of older suburbs and the growth of lower density suburbs even further from city centers. An alternative strategy is the deliberate design of "new towns" and the protection of green belts around cities. Some social reformers attempted to combine the best of both concepts in the garden city movement. In the U.S., 1950 was the first year that more people lived in suburbs than elsewhere. In
12462-523: The inter-war period, while the former farmhouse was demolished in the 1950s to make way for a public house, The Blackbird, later renamed Blarney Stone, which itself was demolished in 2011. The building of the old St Andrew's Church still exists on Old Church Lane. Because of its location it is often referred to as being in Wembley Park or Neasden. Holy Innocents church is located on Kingsbury Road, next to Oliver Goldsmith Primary School and opposite
12596-418: The kind built in the inner Metro-land suburbs in the 1930s "aped larger houses, the stockbroker Tudorbethan of Edwardian Surrey and Middlesex", they were in fact "pokey". He reflected that as [the husband] went off to the nearest station every morning ... the wife, half liberated and half slave, stayed behind wondering how many of the newly invented domestic appliances they could afford to purchase, and how long
12730-771: The large amount of undeveloped land within the city. The city actually has a policy of densifying its new developments. In China, the term suburb is new, although suburbs are already being constructed rapidly. Chinese suburbs mostly consist of rows upon rows of apartment blocks and condos that end abruptly into the countryside. Also new town developments are extremely common. Single family suburban homes tend to be similar to their Western equivalents; although primarily outside Beijing and Shanghai, also mimic Spanish and Italian architecture. In Hong Kong, however, suburbs are mostly government-planned new towns containing numerous public housing estates. However, other new towns also contain private housing estates and low density developments for
12864-517: The local garage proprietor by slapping him on the back and offering him a pint of 'four 'alf'". With similar ambiguity, Metro-land combined idyllic photographs of rural tranquillity with advertising spreads for new, though leafy, housing developments. Herein lay the contradictions well captured by Leslie Thomas in his novel, The Tropic of Ruislip (1974): "in the country but not of it. The fields seemed touchable and yet remote". Writer and historian A. N. Wilson reflected how suburban developments of
12998-424: The location of residential areas outside of the city center by creating wide areas or "zones" where only residential buildings were permitted. These suburban residences are built on larger lots of land than in the central city. For example, the lot size for a residence in Chicago is usually 125 feet (38 m) deep, while the width can vary from 14 feet (4.3 m) wide for a row house to 45 feet (14 m) wide for
13132-740: The lower-density suburbs on the outskirts of the urban area. The term 'middle suburbs' is also used. Inner suburbs , such as Te Aro in Wellington, Eden Terrace in Auckland, Prahran in Melbourne and Ultimo in Sydney, are usually characterized by higher density apartment housing and greater integration between commercial and residential areas. In the United States and Canada , suburb can refer either to an outlying residential area of
13266-604: The man would hold on to his job in the Slump . No wonder, when war came, that so many of these suburban prisoners felt a sense of release. By the end of the Second World War architects in general were turning their backs on suburbia; the very word tended to be used pejoratively, even contemptuously. In 1951 Michael Young , one of the architects of the Labour Party's electoral victory in 1945, observed that "one suburb
13400-481: The mantle of countryman ("the tinkle of the hammer on the anvil in the country smithy, the sound of the scythe against the whetstone"). As one historian of the London Underground put it wryly, "the world of Metroland is not cluttered with people: its suburban streets are empty ... There are, it seems, more farm animals than people." A more cynical view, that sought to contrast illusion with changing times,
13534-521: The most heavily suburbanized country in the world, by a considerable margin. Boston and New York City spawned the first major suburbs. The streetcar lines in Boston and the rail lines in Manhattan made daily commutes possible. No metropolitan area in the world was as well served by railroad commuter lines at the turn of the twentieth century as New York, and it was the rail lines to Westchester from
13668-411: The needs of the area were not well-served. In 1900 Kingsbury became a separate urban district with six councillors. The new council was immediately involved in controversy and in 1906 it failed to make a rate or meet its financial commitments. Following an inquiry initiated by ratepayers, the councillors numbered nine, not halting fiscal accusations directed towards the initial three councillors. In 1934
13802-482: The outskirts of the city were generally inhabited by the very poorest. Due to the rapid migration of the rural poor to the industrializing cities of England in the late 18th century, a trend in the opposite direction began to develop, whereby newly rich members of the middle classes began to purchase estates and villas on the outskirts of London. This trend accelerated through the 19th century, especially in cities like London and Birmingham that were growing rapidly, and
13936-567: The panache and vision of Charles Holden 's striking, modern designs for the Underground group in the late 1920s and early 1930s. Nearly 70 years later the Chilterns Conservation Board was advertising "Chilterns Country – countryside walks from rail stations" (2004). Drawing no doubt on "Metro-land, a guide for ramblers", published by British Railways Southern Region shortly after the Second World War, it referred to
14070-484: The part of Kingsbury adjacent to Hendon aerodrome during the war, while the road network was improved to cater for the British Empire Exhibition in nearby Wembley in 1924. The number of inhabited houses in the civil parish increased from just 140 in 1901 to 3,937 in 1931. By 1951 this had risen to 11,776. Between 1921 and 1931 Kingsbury's population increased by 796%. Population growth meant
14204-612: The population of Harrow Weald rose from 1,500 to 11,000 and that of Pinner from 3,000 to 23,000. In 1932 Northwick Park was said to have grown over the previous five years at the rate of 1,000 houses annually and Rayners Lane to "repay a visit at short intervals to see it grow". In the mid-20th century the spirit of Metro-land was evoked in three "late chrysanthemums" by Sir John Betjeman (1906–1984), Poet Laureate from 1972 until his death: "Harrow-on-the-Hill" ("When melancholy autumn comes to Wembley / And electric trains are lighted after tea"), "Middlesex" ("Gaily into Ruislip Gardens / Runs
14338-467: The railway. However, World War I (1914–1918) delayed these plans until 1919, when, with the expectation of a postwar housing-boom, Metropolitan Railway Country Estates Limited (MRCE) formed. MRCE went on to develop estates at Kingsbury Garden Village near Neasden , Wembley Park , Cecil Park and Grange Estate at Pinner and the Cedars Estate at Rickmansworth and to found places such as Harrow Garden Village . The Met's marketing department coined
14472-487: The red electric train") and "The Metropolitan Railway" ("Early Electric! With what radiant hope / Men formed this many-branched electrolier"). In his autobiographical Summoned by Bells (1960) Betjeman recalled that "Metroland / Beckoned us out to lanes in beechy Bucks". Described much later by The Times as the "hymnologist of Metroland", Betjeman reached a wider audience with his celebrated documentary for BBC Television, Metro-land , directed by Edward Mirzoeff , which
14606-474: The station's vicinity and a new population centre for Kingsbury. The Kingsbury Odeon cinema opened in 1934 and existed until 1972 - today it is an Aldi supermarket. A public house called the Prince of Wales existed in front of the roundabout, which was demolished and replaced by a Tesco supermarket and flats in 2008. A major part of the district is the large Fryent Country Park which contains fields, woods,
14740-477: The suburban areas that were built in north-west London and in Buckinghamshire, Hertfordshire and Middlesex following the Metropolitan branches. It had become immortalised well before the guide stopped being published. A song called "My Little Metro-land Home" had been published in 1920, and Evelyn Waugh ’s novel Decline and Fall (1928) has a character marrying a Viscount Metroland. She reappears, with
14874-579: The suburbs was facilitated by the development of zoning laws, redlining and numerous innovations in transport. Redlining and other discriminatory measures built into federal housing policy furthered the racial segregation of postwar America–for example, by refusing to insure mortgages in and near African-American neighborhoods. The government's efforts were primarily designed to provide housing to White middle-class and lower-middle-class families. African Americans and other people of color largely remained concentrated within decaying cores of urban poverty creating
15008-458: The surrounding community. There is also a council-run library here. At its western end is Kingsbury Circle, a roundabout where roads leading to Wembley Park , Kenton & Harrow , and Queensbury & Stanmore along with Kingsbury Road meet.The surrounding area has places to dine. This area remained agricultural until the Metropolitan Railway extension to Stanmore opening the station in 1932. This effectively caused further development in
15142-780: The term Metro-land in 1915 when the Guide to the Extension Line became the Metro-land guide, priced at 1 d . This promoted the land served by the Met for the walker, visitor and later the house-hunter. Published annually until 1932 (the last full year of independence for the Met), the guide extolled the benefits of "The good air of the Chilterns", using language such as "Each lover of Metroland may well have his own favorite wood beech and coppice — all tremulous green loveliness in Spring and russet and gold in October". The dream as promoted involved
15276-400: The title Lady Metroland, in two more of Waugh's novels; Vile Bodies (1930) and A Handful of Dust (1934). The British Empire Exhibition further encouraged the new phenomenon of suburban development. Wembley's sewerage was improved, many roads in the area were straightened and widened and new bus services began operating. Visitors were steadily introduced to Wembley and some later moved to
15410-405: The upper classes. In the illustrative case of Rome, Italy, in the 1920s and 1930s, suburbs were intentionally created ex novo to give lower classes a destination, in consideration of the actual and foreseen massive arrival of poor people from other areas of the country. Many critics have seen in this development pattern (which was circularly distributed in every direction) also a quick solution to
15544-666: The virtues of the Poplars estate at Ruislip with the assertion that "It's a very short distance by rail on the Met/And at the gate you'll find waiting, sweet Violet". Queensbury and its local surroundings and characters were cited in the song "Queensbury Station" by the Berlin-based punk-jazz band The Magoo Brothers on their album "Beyond Believable", released on the Bouncing Corporation label in 1988. The song
15678-467: The wider sense noted in the lead paragraph) have become formalized as geographic subdivisions of a city and are used by postal services in addressing. In rural areas in both countries, their equivalents are called localities (see suburbs and localities ). The terms inner suburb and outer suburb are used to differentiate between the higher-density areas in proximity to the city center (which would not be referred to as 'suburbs' in most other countries), and
15812-574: Was " at the gateway to Metro-land". In similar vein, Chorleywood and Chenies , later described by John Betjeman as "the essential Metro-land", were "at the gateway" of the Chiltern Hills (of which Wendover was the "pearl"). Before the end of the First World War George R. Sims had incorporated the term in verse: "I know a land where the wild flowers grow/Near, near at hand if by train you go,/Metroland, Metroland". By
15946-472: Was a passenger and goods railway that served London from 1863 to 1933, its mainline heading north from the capital's financial heart in the City to what were to become the Middlesex suburbs. Its first line connected the mainline railway termini at Paddington , Euston and King's Cross to the City, and when, on 10 January 1863, this line opened with gas-lit wooden carriages hauled by steam locomotives, it
16080-591: Was allowed to retain such land that it believed was necessary for future railway use. Initially, the surplus land was managed by the Land Committee, and, from the 1880s, the land was developed and sold to domestic buyers in places like Willesden Park Estate, Cecil Park, near Pinner and at Wembley Park. In 1912 it was suggested that a specially formed company should take over from the Surplus Lands Committee and develop suburban estates near
16214-585: Was coined by the Met's marketing department in 1915 when the Guide to the Extension Line became the Metro-land guide, priced at 1 d . This promoted the land served by the Met for the walker, the visitor and later the house-hunter. Published annually until 1932, the last full year of independence for the Met, the guide extolled the benefits of "The good air of the Chilterns," using language such as "Each lover of Metroland may well have his own favourite wood beech and coppice – all tremulous green loveliness in Spring and russet and gold in October." The dream promoted
16348-470: Was developed for housing by the nominally independent Metropolitan Railway Country Estates Limited (MRCE). The term "Metro-land" was coined by the Met's marketing department in 1915 when the Guide to the Extension Line became the Metro-land guide . It promoted a dream of a modern home in beautiful countryside with a fast railway service to central London until the Met was absorbed into the London Passenger Transport Board in 1933. The Metropolitan Railway
16482-428: Was developed through the efforts of social reformer Henrietta Barnett and her husband; inspired by Ebenezer Howard and the model housing development movement (then exemplified by Letchworth garden city), as well as the desire to protect part of Hampstead Heath from development, they established trusts in 1904 which bought 243 acres of land along the newly opened Northern line extension to Golders Green and created
16616-473: Was even etched on the door handles of Metropolitan carriages. Some stations, such as Hillingdon (1923), were built specifically to serve the company's suburban developments. A number, including Wembley Park, Croxley Green (1925) and Stanmore (1932), were designed by Charles W. Clark (who was responsible also for Chiltern Court) in an Arts and crafts "villa" style. These were intended to blend with their surroundings, though, in retrospect, they arguably lacked
16750-468: Was first broadcast on 26 February 1973 and was released as a DVD 33 years later. The critic Clive James , who judged the programme "an instant classic", observed that "it saw how the district had been destroyed by its own success". To mark the centenary of Betjeman's birth his daughter Candida Lycett Green (born 1942) spearheaded a series of celebratory railway events, including an excursion on 2 September 2006 from Marylebone to Quainton Road, now home of
16884-528: Was mainly occupied by the emperor and important officials; the city's people mostly lived in small cities right outside Luoyang, which were suburbs in all but name. As populations grew during the Early Modern Period in Europe, towns swelled with a steady influx of people from the countryside . In some places, nearby settlements were swallowed up as the main city expanded. The peripheral areas on
17018-496: Was managed by the Land Committee, made up of Met directors. In the 1880s, at the same time as the railway was extending beyond Swiss Cottage and building the workers' estate at Neasden, roads and sewers were built at Willesden Park Estate, and the land was sold to builders. Similar developments followed at Cecil Park, near Pinner and, after the failure of the tower at Wembley, plots were sold at Wembley Park. Robert Selbie, then General Manager, thought in 1912 that some professionalism
17152-466: Was needed and suggested a company be formed to take over from the Surplus Lands Committee to develop estates near the railway. The First World War delayed these plans however, and it was 1919, with the expectation of a housing boom, before the MRCE was formed. Concerned that Parliament might reconsider the unique position the Met held, the railway company sought legal advice. The legal opinion was that although
17286-449: Was of a modern home in beautiful countryside with a fast railway service to central London. From about 1914 the company had promoted itself as The Met, but after 1920 the commercial manager, John Wardle, ensured that timetables and other publicity material used the term Metro instead. Land development also occurred in central London when in 1929 a large, luxurious block of apartments called Chiltern Court opened at Baker Street, designed by
17420-478: Was offered in 1934 by the composer and conductor Constant Lambert who "conjure[d] up the hideous faux bonhomie of the hiker , noisily wading his way through the petrol pumps of Metroland, singing obsolete sea chanties [sic] with the aid of the Week-End Book, imbibing chemically flavoured synthetic beer under the impression that he is tossing off a tankard of 'jolly good ale and old' ... and astonishing
17554-410: Was the building of many highways. The Highway Act of 1956 helped to fund the building of 64,000 kilometers across the nation by having 26 billion dollars on hand, which helped to link many more to these shopping centers with ease. These newly built shopping centers, which were often large buildings full of multiple stores, and services, were being used for more than shopping, but as a place of leisure and
17688-496: Was the common condition. Some suburbs had developed around large cities where there was rail transportation to the jobs downtown. However, the real growth in suburbia depended on the availability of automobiles, highways, and inexpensive housing. The population had grown, and the stock of family savings had accumulated the money for down payments, automobiles and appliances. The product was a great housing boom. Whereas an average of 316,000 new non-farm housing units were constructed from
17822-573: Was the world's first underground railway. When, in 1871 plans were presented for an underground railway in Paris, it was called the Métropolitain in imitation of the line in London. The modern word metro is a short form of the French word. The railway was soon extended from both ends and northwards via a branch from Baker Street . It reached Hammersmith in 1864, Richmond in 1877 and completed
17956-463: Was written by Paul Bonin and Melanie Hickford, who both grew up and lived in the area. In 1997, Metroland was the title and setting for a movie starring Christian Bale about the development of the relationship between a husband and wife living in the area. The movie was based on the novel of the same name written by Julian Barnes. Orchestral Manoeuvres in the Dark recorded a song Metroland on
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