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?

London is very big.

It doesn't get any smaller just because you're a slow walker!

For those that don't consider twickenham London, where is it? Middlesex doesn't exist anymore so where else could you say?

For those that don't consider twickenham London, where is it? Middlesex doesn't exist anymore so where else could you say?

this always makes me laugh, the cool London crowd (who are probably not Londoners in the first place) can't stand be associated with the suburbs, so claim that the outer London Boroughs are not part of London. (the clue is in the name)

The Hyacinth Bouquet types claim to live in surrey, when actually they live in Croydon or Bromley

I gave my (foreign) students a quiz about London, 1 question asked how many international airports London has. They guessed 1 - Heathrow. The correct answer was 5.

Heathrow - of course!
City - naturally.
Gatwick - erm.. not technically, surely..
Luton - whaaaat??
Stansted - the fuck??

They were more amused by me screechily pointing at maps of the UK and refusing to believe that Stansted was anywhere near London than they were by the quiz.

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

Bromley is in London. Greater London

...and comes under the Lewisham west consituency!

this always makes me laugh, the cool London crowd (who are probably not Londoners in the first place) can't stand be associated with the suburbs, so claim that the outer London Boroughs are not part of London. (the clue is in the name

I was born in London, nothing about not wanting to be associated with suburbs. Just not seeing a place that is geographically not london as london. No true Londoner would give Coulsdon as an example of somewhere in London whatever anyone says on here.

The Hyacinth Bouquet types claim to live in surrey, when actually they live in Croydon or Bromley

How could anyone living in Bromley claim to live in surrey? you mean kent surely?

you can, by personal prejudice, or whim, or habit, say that in your own mind, you don't consider certain London Boroughs to be part of London.

And someone else might say that in their mind, they consider Hampstead Heath to be part of Northumberland, or Wanstead to be in Suffolk.

But as a matter of fact, not opinion, London Boroughs are London.

Snickers will always be Marathons to me too

I wasn't born until the early 70s, the local authorities had changed some years before that, this debate will rumble on forever, because I have never in RL heard anyone say that the areas Ive mentioned are anything other than Surrey.

I accept that technically they are London, Ive said that from the start of this thread, but really no they are not.

Piglet ! Great message. I am an East End Greater Londoner although not bothered to be 'tarnished' by Essex gibes either. Although I admit I didn't realise until recently Croydon was 208.

I think the difference is between London-the-capital-city and London-the-region/equivalent-of-a-county.

Bethnal Green, Knightsbridge and Camden are clearly in London-the-capital-city. Places like Bromley, Croydon and Hillingdon are gobbled-up-by-London outer suburbia - in the 'county' of Greater London but not actually London London.

Terminology is awkward because you can't talk about the city (as in metropolitan centre) without distinguishing it from The City (financial district) and the City of Westminster crops up as well just to add confusion.

My late Auntie Pat, born and brung up in Fulham in the days when policemen only dared to walk round there in pairs (and there was a proper working river), who had an accent so gravelly you could use it to scrape barnacles off the bottom of a boat, would piss herself laughing if someone from Croydon claimed to be a Londoner...

Agrees wholeheartedly with Amber and Edam.

They are not London. It also pisses me off when an idiot on the regional TV news FGS describes Romford as London, or describes somewhere like East Ham as The East End conjuring up visions of swirling fog and Jack The Ripper.

And when they say Playstow.

Buy a fucking A-Z and put it on exes.

BTW. People in Greater London voted overwhelmingly for that arsehole Boris Johnson.

Thanks, you people in Zone 6.

postcodes are about ease of delivery we have glasgow postcode but live in argyll jolly useful as if argyll in address lots of cheap couriers don;t deliver without surcharge, once upon a time 15 years ago a l of
scottish islands had paisley postcodes because their mail was sent via glasgow airport which is in paisley, lots of them mull etc still have PA postcodes, most old county boundaries regarding mail postcodes were not changed when local government areas changed

Basically it's quite simple. There is inner London and outer London.

There are 12 inner and 20 outer London Boroughs (the outer coming under the Greater London authority.

Croydon Council has been part of Greater London since 1965, but the Royal Mail map still has the town within the Surrey county, for some reason.

So Croydon is part of London.

End.

To be in London, you need three things:

London borough
London telephone number
London postcode.

Trufact.

Penge is SE20. Crystal Palace is SE19. Both London.

Croydon is CR0 or CR2. Not London. Surrey. Or CR8 (I think). And I say this as someone who grew up a Londoner then moved out to Croydon.

It's funny, I remember a thread on here a while ago complaining about people who claimed to live in Surrey when their zone 5/6 suburbs were OBVIOUSLY London.

We've moved to one of these places now and it is odd - neither fish nor fowl. Face north and you're in London, face south and you're in Surrey. And either way there's someone looking down at you for neither being a proper Londoner nor a proper Home Counties type.

BTW. People in Greater London voted overwhelmingly for that arsehole Boris Johnson

Thanks, you people in Zone 6

Ah, yes. Explains a lot

South Woodford is E18. Chingford is E5. I lived near them. They're definitely Essex, no matter what the postcodes say. In fact, when I was growing up, some older people were bitterly disappointed that they were classified as East London.

South Woodford girls are just as gorgeous as if they were Essex girls, but speak nicer.

If you can get on a tube then you're in London.

And if you are in "Greater London" then you're in errrr..... London

Therefore Richmond is undoubtedly in London and has been since anyone who matters has lived here (ie me)

Mind unlike everyone else - I am trying to pretend it is in Surrey, dahling.

I live in the London Borough of Barnet, however not in the area of that borough that is called 'Barnet' (that bit has post code EN). TFL zone 4. 0208 telephone number. Postcode N12. All London yes?
But out of my back window it's all fields from here to the M25. Out of my front window it's all built up. London is weird. And great.

Cross post with Motheristhebestbet!