Where is London?

[namechangenumber45]

This is not intended to be a "London bashing thread" so please take question (from northerner) in spirit intended - one of curiosity.

I have been watching the news and an awful update on situation in Penge where a young boy and woman killed. I've never heard of this suburb and couldn't place it on a map - but on looking it seems to be a bit further from what I'd class as "London".

So my AIBU to ask where London starts and finishes?

Have the boundaries expanded? Are there some areas that would be SouthEast a few years ago but are now London?

There was a green bus that started almost from the end of my central London street to a part of London that I consider to be a suburb. Boris got rid of it in favour of one of those red greenhouses on wheels. I don't know why.

So are you saying, EnthusiasmDisturbed, that people who live in the London borough of Bromley with a London postcode live in London, but people who live in the exact same same London Borough of Bromley without a London postcode, don't live in London?

We agree that people can do what they want then, BlancheBlue? And that people who are rude can be told to sod off? I wouldn't confine that to journalists btw.

limited define "green bus" please? As in envo credentials or colour?

limited better start having a word with yourself too

My personal geography of London stretches from about Brixton up to Muswell Hill, and about Richmond to Barking. I find it hard to explain exactly why I feel this, but I think it has something to do with a mix of retail and a certain density of living that feels different from that of suburbs where there are acres of suburban housing with very limited local shops.

FWIW, I have lived both in this zone and outside it in the suburbs!! I'm not implying that the suburban belt outside it is less 'good' in any way!

" My personal geography of London stretches from about Brixton up to Muswell Hill, "

ha you must be from North London then.
It always used to amuse me when people from eg Highgate or Muswell Hill would talkabout every other suburb as 'really far out'.....

Yes

London Borough of Bromley goes right up to Crystal Palace Station. Address in that area London SE19 ..... (maybe SE26 too)

Bromley postcode is Kent (if writing full address) BR....

Bromley town centre is not London

It was coloured green Blanche. The replacements may be more environmentally friendly but they are not passenger-friendly on a sunny day which can occur at any time of the year.

What do you mean by this?:

limited better start having a word with yourself too

not in London

user - actually I'm from the East originally, born and bred!

Stop assuming that there are necessarily value judgments built into this! Psychogeography is A Thing, so is urban exploration. We all have different mental maps of our cities, depending on our experience. Sometimes using various techniques to break out of the everyday and see cities anew can really be enriching.

I think there are interesting questions about where and why we perceive the urban landscape changing from one kind of area to another, too. We are really sensitive to very tiny clues from the environment, whether they are about history, socio-economics, aesthetics, whatever - we process them almost unconsciously, and making them conscious is another interesting exercise.

piglet those always looked better in network south east livery

" We all have different mental maps of our cities, depending on our experience."

That is true, and kind of what I meant....
interesting subject,,

So there's the City of London, then Greater London. Is that correct? Which would mean all of the above being in "London"? I might have to spend some time on Google this evening when the kids are in bed. Amazing how little I know about the place I've lived my whole life.

LurkingHusband were you at any of the events where the GLC celebrated its abolition with a bang not a whisper?

IIRC it was April ? I have a sneaking feeling I was sitting in, protesting tuition fees.

lurking you paint a very simplistic picture of Bromley and "fares fair"

Well it's a teenagers viewpoint. Before: high fares and massive congestion, and a Byzantine ticket scheme. After: lower fares (because I went up town a lot more) and the invention of the millennium - the Travelcard.

It seems strange in this age of Facebook and digital watches that back in the 80s, if there were 2 bus companies, you needed 2 tickets to complete a journey ! Imagine trying to have a scheme like that these days. People would think you were loopy !

One of my political awakenings was meeting Ken Livingstone, and realising the press had done a real hatchet job on him.

" So there's the City of London, then Greater London."

well I think there would be something in between, as the City only covers a square mile and Greater London would include eg Bromley, Harrow etc

MrsFizzy I think as this thread has shown people have wildly different definitions of what London means in any context and people seem to dislike any state/legal definitions!

Have a read of: en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Greater_London

The City of London should not be confused with the city of London - the first of these is a distinct district in central London, the latter is what this thread is arguing about. Central London includes a lot more than The City, for example it includes the city of Westminster. Greater London is then the wider political entity that includes central London all the way out to those leafy suburbs.

I agree with others that postcodes are a useless way to determine what is in London. But there is clearly no one definition that fits all uses and contexts.

Anybody else not give a stuff about postcodes etc but just surprised just how far out ammersham is? It's in the middle of nowhere but gets tube! (Don't know why I'm fascinated by that)

the tube grew up from an assortment of commuter lines, so whoever built that one would have had a tie-up with a property developer in Amersham, typically buying up land in a cheap area at the back of beyond, and throwing up thousands of houses that would become valuable commuter homes once the railway could take them into town.

Anybody else not give a stuff about postcodes etc but just surprised just how far out Amersham is? It's in the middle of nowhere but gets tube!

Proof (if it were needed) that money talks. It's not just the distance out - if you know your tube, you will know there are express services from Amersham which completely bypass the proles - there's an extra track just for it.

I used to be able to leave my house at 08:00, catch the 08:17 express from Rayners Lane (Harrow-on-the-Hill, Finchley Road) into Baker St. for 08:37 and walk to Marble Arch for before 09:00.

Nowhere else in the country is that commute even fantasy, let alone reality.

It's little facts like that which go some way top explaining why things are the way they are ....

I like Amersham - the part of the town near the station is a result of the railway - Old Amersham is the "historic" Amersham.

start at 2.40

vimeo.com/89603339

lurking any Amersham commuters still moaning about the abolition of the Chesham shuttle and hence two LT services an hour usually rather than four previously

" if you know your tube, you will know there are express services from Amersham which completely bypass the proles - there's an extra track just for it."

hadnt really thought about it before but that must be why that stretch of tube from Harrow hill down to Finchley Road is so scarily fast!
I loved living at Chalfont st somthing one summer....I would stay there five nights, cycle to the station, put my bike on the tube, get off at marlybone, and cycle to Brixton in time for last orders! Then back again two days later....I was so thin!