To wonder why people increasingly refer to places not in London as 'in London'

[redpipe]

I genuinely don't understand why people say they live in London when in fact they live in a town within the M25.
Croydon is not in London is it? Nor is Kingston. I never remember people referring to these towns as London years ago. Is this a new thing?

Flatmum the measurement to London would have specifically been to the cross in the pavement at Charing Cross station, or so I've heard!

Yes, the measurement for the distance from 'London' is Charing Cross isn't it?

Lords is the home of the MCC and Middlesex CC.

London is surely everything south east of Birmingham?

Why are people not getting this? Places like Enfield are a London Borough, they are called greater London. If you want to tell yourself its not London, that's fine but it is actually greater London, so you'd be a bit wrong.

1.City of London (not a London borough)
2.City of Westminster
3.Kensington and Chelsea
4.Hammersmith and Fulham
5.Wandsworth
6.Lambeth
7.Southwark
8.Tower Hamlets
9.Hackney
10.Islington
11.Camden
12.Brent
13.Ealing
14.Hounslow
15.Richmond upon Thames
16.Kingston upon Thames
17.Merton
18.Sutton
19.Croydon
20.Bromley
21.Lewisham
22.Greenwich
23.Bexley
24.Havering
25.Barking and Dagenham
26.Redbridge
27.Newham
28.Waltham Forest
29.Haringey
30.Enfield
31.Barnet
32.Harrow
33.Hillingdon

Had this discussion yesterday- is Ealing "London", or not London?

My MiL wanted to meet my DH in London for an hospital visit. We all live in Scotland,although I used to live in London and know it well. She assured my DH that she would meet him at the roundabout by the Hammersmith flyover, she was staying with a friend in London. Imagine his amusement (and mine) when she talked, at length of her lovely bus trip into the centre past Stonehenge.

She was staying in Bristol, that famous London suburb.

ooooh thank you candycoated x

Richmond is mopst decidedly NOT Surrey!
It may have Surrey in its Postal address, but it is the London Borough Of Richmond (similarily for Kingston, Croydon etc), they are not in the County of Surrey.

Vacant It's greater London. Good old Ealing!

Penge is in the London borough of Bromley and has the SE20 postcode.

Bromley is in London. Greater London

Penge is SUCH an unpleasant word.

Crystal palaceis actually in Bromley.

The shops part is at the meeting point of southwark, Croydon and bromley boroughs.

Still in London though, hestershaw

How do you say Penge?

Is it 'Penj' or 'Peng'?

I had never even heard of it until I went there last year for a wedding!

I would say I live in London and in Essex, though tend to say on the the outskirts/periphery of London.
I can walk to the M25 in about 10 minutes and consider 'proper Essex' to be beyond there as this is where the London Borough finishes.

The other reason I consider myself part of London is that I can drive all the way into London without a break between towns - it just all flows into one.
I've almost always lived in Havering and definitely consider myself a Londoner.

It's ponje.

Joking.

Actually is penj.

It's Penj.

Sometimes I say I live in north west London, sometimes Harrow, sometimes my particular town/suburb. Depends what the person I'm talking to is familiar with. I consider myself to live in outer London, but my postal address is Middlesex.

I find this thread really weird.

It's full of people saying "The London Borough of X is not in London."

Yes it is!

My Nan's brother lived in ongar in Essex which had a tube station. Miles out from the m25 so def not in London lol.

*has

I think it's a matter of perception. Croydon might technically be in London but to me it just doesn't seem to be London; likewise for Kingston. Just a little bit too far away to be properly metropolitan. For me if it takes more than an hour to walk to Charing Cross or Westminster then it really doesn't feel like London or seem quite right.

According to research carried out a few year ago, because of the number of people who commute from here to London daily for work, Norfolk is technically a suburb of London.

So I live in London too.