Capital of Great Britain, SE England, on both sides of the Thames River. Greater London (1991 pop. 6,378,600), c.620 sq mi (1,610 sq km), consists of the Corporation of the City of London (1991 pop. 4,000), usually called the City, plus 32 boroughs. The City is the old city of London and is the modern city’s commercial center; it is also referred to as the “Square Mile� because of its area. The 12 inner boroughs that surround the City are Westminster, Camden, Islington, Hackney, Tower Hamlets, Greenwich, Lewisham, Southwark, Lambeth, Wandsworth, Hammersmith and Fulham, Kensington and Chelsea. The 20 outer boroughs are Waltham Forest, Redbridge, Havering, Barking and Dagenham, Newham, Bexley, Bromley, Croydon, Sutton, Merton, Kingston upon Thames, Richmond upon Thames, Hounslow, Hillingdon, Ealing, Brent, Harrow, Barnet, Haringey, and Enfield. Greater London includes the area of the former county of London, most of the former county of Middlesex, and areas that were formerly in Surrey, Kent, Essex, and Hertfordshire. Each of the boroughs of Greater London elects a council.
The Greater London Council administered the larger London area until 1986, when it was abolished by the Thatcher government, making London unique as a world metropolis without a central governing unit. In 1999 the Greater London Authority Act reestablished a single local governing body for the Greater London area, consisting of an elected mayor and the London Assembly. Elections were held in 2000, and Ken Livingstone became London’s first elected mayor.

City is the old city of London and is the modern city’s commercial center; it is also referred to as the “Square Mileâ€? because of its area. The 12 inner boroughs that surround the City are Westminster , Camden , Islington , Hackney , Tower Hamlets , Greenwich , Lewisham , Southwark , Lambeth , Wandsworth , Hammersmith and Fulham , Kensington and Chelsea . The 20 outer boroughs are Waltham Forest , Redbridge , Havering , Barking and Dagenham , Newham , Bexley , Bromley , Croydon , Sutton , Merton , Kingston upon Thames , Richmond upon Thames , Hounslow , Hillingdon , Ealing , Brent , Harrow , Barnet , Haringey , and Enfield . Greater London includes the area of the former county of London, most of the former county of Middlesex, and areas that were formerly in Surrey, Kent, Essex, and Hertfordshire. Each of the boroughs of Greater London elects a council. The Greater London Council administered the larger London area until 1986, when it was abolished by the Thatcher government, making London unique as a world metropolis without a central governing unit. In 1999 the Greater London Authority Act reestablished a single local governing body for the Greater London area, consisting of an elected mayor and the London Assembly. Elections were held in 2000, and Ken Livingstone became London’s first elected mayor.

London - the grand resonance of its very name suggests history and might. Its opportunities for entertainment by day and night go on and on and on. It’s a city that exhilarates and intimidates, stimulates and irritates in equal measure, a grubby Monopoly board studded with stellar sights.

AAAA It’s a cosmopolitan mix of Third and First Worlds, chauffeurs and beggars, the stubbornly traditional and the proudly avant-garde. But somehow - between ‘er Majesty and Boy George, Damien Hirst and JMW Turner, Bow Bells and Big Ben - it all hangs together.

The city is so enormous visitors will need to make maximum use of the underground train system: unfortunately, this dislocates the geography and makes it hard to get your bearings. A ride on a red double-decker bus (a quintessential London experience) will help piece things together.

Area: 1,572 sq km
Population: 7.2 million
Country: England
Time Zone: GMT/UTC 0 (Greenwich Mean Time)
Telephone Area Code: 020

Orientation

The main geographical feature of the city is the river Thames, which meanders through central London, dividing it into northern and southern halves. The central area and the most important sights, theatres and restaurants are within the Underground’s Circle Line on the north bank of the river. The trendy and tourist-ridden West End lies within the western portion of the loop and includes Soho, Trafalgar Square, Piccadilly Circus, Leicester Square and Regent St. The East End, so beloved of Ealing comedies, lies east of the Circle Line; it used to be the exclusive preserve of the Cockney but is now a cultural melting pot. There are interesting inner-city suburbs in North London, including Islington and Camden Town. South London includes a mess of poor, dirty, graffiti-ridden suburbs, such as Brixton, which have vibrant subcultures of their own and are in many ways where the real vitality of London lies.

History

Little is known of London prior to A.D. 61, when, according to the Roman historian Tacitus, the followers of Queen Boadicea rebelled and slaughtered the inhabitants of the Roman fort Londinium. Roman authority was soon restored, and the first city walls were built, remnants of which still exist. After the final withdrawal of the Roman legions in the 5th cent., London was lost in obscurity. Celts, Saxons, and Danes contested the general area, and it was not until 886 that London again emerged as an important town under the firm control of King Alfred, who rebuilt the defenses against the Danes and gave the city a government.
London put up some resistance to William I in 1066, but he subsequently treated the city well. During his reign the White Tower, the nucleus of the Tower of London, was built just east of the city wall. Under the Normans and Plantagenets (see Great Britain), the city grew commercially and politically and during the reign of Richard I (1189–99) obtained a form of municipal government from which the modern City Corporation developed. In 1215, King John granted the city the right to elect a mayor annually.
The guilds of the Middle Ages gained control of civic affairs and grew sufficiently strong to restrict trade to freemen of the city. The guilds survive today in 80 livery companies, of which members were once the voters in London’s municipal elections. Medieval London saw the foundation of the Inns of Court and the construction of Westminster Abbey. By the 14th cent. London had become the political capital of England. It played no active role in the Wars of the Roses (15th cent.).
The reign of Elizabeth I brought London to a level of great wealth, power, and influence as the undisputed center of England’s Renaissance culture. This was the time of Shakespeare (and the Globe Theatre) and the beginnings of overseas trading companies such as the Muscovy Company. With the advent (1603) of the Stuarts to the throne, the city became involved in struggles with the crown on behalf of its democratic privileges, culminating in the English civil war.
In 1665, the great plague took some 75,000 lives. A great fire in Sept., 1666, lasted five days and virtually destroyed the city. Sir Christopher Wren played a large role in rebuilding the city. He designed more than 51 churches, notably the rebuilt St. Paul’s Cathedral. Other notable churches include the gothic Southwark Cathedral, St. Paul’s Church (1633; designed by Inigo Jones), St. Martin-in-the-Fields (18th cent.), and Westminster Cathedral. Much of the business of London as well as literary and political discussion was transacted in coffeehouses, forerunners of the modern club. Until 1750, when Westminster Bridge was opened, London Bridge, first built in the 10th cent., was the only bridge to span the Thames. Since the 18th cent., several other bridges have been constructed; the Tower Bridge was completed in 1894.
In the 19th cent., London began a period of extraordinary growth. The area of present-day Greater London had about 1.1 million people in 1801; by 1851, the population had increased to 2.7 million, and by 1901 to 6.6 million. During the Victorian era, London acquired tremendous prestige as the capital of the British Empire and as a cultural and intellectual center. Britain’s free political institutions and intellectual atmosphere made London a haven for persons unsafe in their own countries. The Italian Giuseppe Mazzini, the Russian Aleksandr Herzen, and the German Karl Marx were among many politically controversial figures who lived for long periods in London.
Many buildings of central London were destroyed or damaged in air raids during World War II. These include the Guildhall (scene of the lord mayor’s banquets and other public functions); No. 10 Downing Street, the prime minister’s residence; the Inns of Court; Westminster Hall and the Houses of Parliament; St. George’s Cathedral; and many of the great halls of the ancient livery companies. Today there are numerous blocks of new office buildings and districts of apartment dwellings constructed by government authorities. The growth of London in the 20th cent. has been extensively planned. One notable feature has been the concept of a “Green Belt� to save certain areas from intensive urban development. In 1982, a tax-free zone in the Docklands in the East End’s Tower Hamlets borough was created to stimulate development. Although the Canary Wharf financial center (with Lloyd’s futuristic building, opened in 1986) was initially slow to fill, it now rivals the City.
London has an ethnically and culturally diverse population, with large groups of immigrants from Commonwealth nations. South Asian, West Indian, African, and Middle Eastern peoples account for much of the immigrant population. The city is the site of one of the largest Hindu temple complexes and the largest Sikh temple outside India; there also are many mosques, including one of the largest in Europe. With the reestablishment of the city’s central government (2000), London built its egg-shaped City Hall (2002), on the south bank of the Thames opposite the Tower of London.
Although a Celtic community settled around a ford across the River Thames, it was the Romans who first developed the square mile now known as the City of London. They built a bridge and an impressive city wall, and made Londinium an important port and the hub of their road system. The Romans left, but trade went on. Few traces of London dating from the Dark Ages can now be found, but the city survived the incursions of both the Saxons and Vikings. Fifty years before the Normans arrived, Edward the Confessor built his abbey and palace at Westminster.

William the Conqueror found a city that was, without doubt, the richest and largest in the kingdom. He raised the White Tower (part of the Tower of London) and confirmed the city’s independence and right to self-government. During the reign of Elizabeth I, the capital began to expand rapidly - in 40 years the population doubled to reach 200,000. Unfortunately, the medieval, Tudor and Jacobean parts of London were virtually destroyed by the Great Fire of 1666. The fire gave Christopher Wren the opportunity to build his famous churches, and the city’s growth continued apace.

By 1720 it contained 750,000 people, and as the seat of Parliament and focal point for a growing empire, it was becoming ever richer and more important. Georgian architects replaced the last of medieval London with their imposing symmetrical architecture and residential squares. The population exploded again in the 19th century, creating a vast expanse of Victorian suburbs. As a result of the Industrial Revolution and rapidly expanding commerce, it jumped from 2.7 million in 1851 to 6.6 million in 1901.

War in the first half of the 20th century destroyed many of the gains achieved by the previous century. Georgian and Victorian London was devastated by the Luftwaffe in WWII - huge swathes of the centre and the East End were totally flattened. After the war, ugly housing and low-cost developments were thrown up on the bomb sites. The docks never recovered - shipping moved to Tilbury, and the Docklands declined to the point of dereliction. In the heady 1980s, that decade of Thatcherite confidence and deregulation, the Docklands were rediscovered by a new wave of property developers, who proved to be only marginally more discriminating than the Luftwaffe.

London briefly regained its swinging reputation in the 1990s, buoyed by Tony Blair’s New Labour, a rampaging pound and a swag of pop, style and media ‘names’. Blair’s bane, Ken Livingstone, donned the mayoral robes in May 2000, opposing plans to sell off the Tube and pushing for improved public transport and safety. The face of the city changed with the construction of the costly white elephant Millennium Dome, the London Eye observation wheel, the Tate Modern (linked by the structurally unsound Millennium Bridge) and the creation of the British Museum’s Great Court. But some things never change: London’s cost of living outdoes itself year after year, its chic quotient continues to soar and the gap between the haves and have-nots looms ever larger

Geography and climate

Greater London covers an area of 609 square miles (1,579 km²). London is a port on the Thames, a navigable river. The river has had a major influence on the development of the city. London was founded on the north bank of the Thames and there was only a single bridge, London Bridge, for many centuries. As a result, the main focus of the city was on the north side of the Thames. When more bridges were built in the 18th century, the city expanded in all directions as the mostly flat or gently rolling countryside around the Thames floodplain presented no obstacle to growth. There are some hills in London, examples being Parliament Hill and Primrose Hill, but these provided fine prospects of the city centre without significantly affecting the directions of the spread of the city and London is therefore roughly circular.

The Thames was once a much broader, shallower river than it is today. It has been extensively embanked, and many of its London tributaries now flow underground. The Thames is a tidal river, and London is vulnerable to flooding. The threat has increased over time due to a slow but continuous rise in high water level and the slow ’tilting’ of Britain (up in the north and down in the south) caused by post-glacial rebound. The Thames Barrier was constructed across the Thames at Woolwich in the 1970s to deal with this threat, but in early 2005 it was suggested that a ten-mile long barrier further downstream might be required to deal with the flood risk in the future.

London has a temperate climate, with warm but seldom hot summers, cool but rarely severe winters, and regular but generally light precipitation throughout the year. Summer temperatures rarely rise much above 33°C (91.4°F), though higher temperatures have become more common recently. The highest temperature ever recorded in London was 37.9°C (100.2°F), measured at Heathrow Airport during the European Heat Wave of 2003. Heavy snowfalls are almost unknown. In recent winters, snow has generally only settled once or twice and it is rarely more than an inch (25 mm). London’s average annual precipitation of less than 24 inches (600 mm) is lower than that of Rome or Sydney. London’s large built up area creates a microclimate, with heat stored by the city’s buildings: sometimes temperatures are 5°C (9°F) warmer in the city than in the surrounding areas.

Modern London

A downstream view of the London Millennium Bridge spanning the River Thames between Tate Modern gallery and St. Paul’s Cathedral.

Today Greater London comprises the City of London, 32 London boroughs (including the City of Westminster), and the Inner and Middle Temples. The dominant centre of activity in London is the City of Westminster (including the West End) which is the main cultural, entertainment and shopping district, the location of most of London’s major corporate headquarters outside of the financial services sector, and the centre of the UK’s national government. The City of London, (known as the “Square Mile"), is an important financial centre. Very busy during the working week, most parts of the City tend to be quiet at weekends, since it is primarily a non-residential area.

London attracts very large numbers of visitors and tourists. Tourist attractions are mainly in Central London, comprising the historic City of London; the West End with its cinemas, bars, clubs, theatres, shops and restaurants; the City of Westminster with the Royal palaces of Buckingham Palace, Clarence House etc., the Royal Borough of Kensington and Chelsea with its museums (the Science Museum, Natural History Museum, and Victoria and Albert Museum) and Hyde Park. Other important tourist attractions include the Bankside area of Southwark with the Globe Theatre, Tate Modern, and London Bridge, Tower Bridge and the Tower of London, Tate Britain on the Embankment, the British Museum in Bloomsbury. There are many other museums and places of interest.

Government

City Hall at night. The Greater London Authority meets here.

Greater London is divided into the 32 London boroughs and the City of London. The boroughs are the most important unit of local government in London, and are responsible for running most local services in their respective areas. The City of London is run not by a conventional local authority, but by the historical Corporation of London.

The Greater London Authority (GLA) is the London-wide body responsible for co-ordinating the boroughs, strategic planning, and running some London-wide services such as policing, the fire service and transport. The GLA consists of the Mayor of London and the London Assembly. The mayor is elected by the Supplementary Vote system while the assembly is elected by the Additional Member System.

The incumbent Mayor of London, Ken Livingstone, was elected as an independent candidate in the 2000 election. Despite opposition from all the main political parties and the press, his popularity with Londoners has remained high. Livingstone was expelled from the Labour Party when he opposed the official Labour candidate Frank Dobson in the 2000 Mayoral election. Re-admitted by that party in 2004, he was re-elected as Mayor as an official Labour candidate in the election later that year.

Previous London wide administrative bodies were the Metropolitan Board of Works from 1855-1889; the London County Council from 1889-1965; and the Greater London Council (GLC) from 1965-1986. When the GLC was abolished, most of its functions were devolved to the London boroughs, while others were taken over by joint-boards or other unelected bodies. The boroughs thus enjoyed “unitary status” and a degree of autonomy when the GLC was abolished, and although losing some powers which have been repatriated to the GLA they still retain many areas they did not control under the GLC.

The territorial police force for the 32 London boroughs is the Metropolitan Police Service, more commonly referred to as the Metropolitan Police, or simply “the Met". The City of London has its own police force, the City of London Police.

Health services in London are managed by the national government via the NHS. Greater London is divided into five Strategic Health Authorities [9].

Transport and Infrastructure

Transport is one of the four areas of policy administered by the Mayor of London, but the mayor’s financial control is limited. The executive agency which runs London’s transport system is Transport for London (TfL). The public transport network is one of the most extensive in the world, but faces serious congestion and reliability issues.

Rail

The London Underground at Green Park station.

London’s Underground Railway is the oldest in the world, and possibly one of the busiest. It is thought that more than 3 million people use the Underground every day. The Underground has in recent decades suffered from a lack of sufficient investment since the sums of money needed to keep it fully modernised are very high. This has led to congestion and delays for passengers in some areas of the network, although there have also been improvements, for example the opening of the Jubilee Line Extension. Recently the London Rail and Tram network has received substantial funding.

London has the second largest urban rail system in the world after Tokyo. It includes:
Mainline services
London Underground
Tramlink
Docklands Light Rail
Heathrow Express
Eurostar

Many of the UK’s rail lines radiate from London. London’s rail termini are: Blackfriars, Cannon Street, Charing Cross, Euston, Fenchurch Street, Kings Cross, Liverpool Street, London Bridge (which also has through platforms), Marylebone, Paddington, St. Pancras, Victoria and Waterloo. With the exception of Fenchurch Street, all of these stations also have associated London Underground stations.

The Heathrow Express is not strictly a part of the public rail system, but is owned by BAA plc. As of 2005, Transport for London runs the London Underground (the world’s first underground rail network or metro), commonly also known as “The Tube". The national government’s recently introduced public–private partnerships to the Underground despite opposition from many parties, including the Mayor of London.

The largest project currently underway is the Channel Tunnel Rail Link, (CTRL) Phase 2, which will provide fast Eurostar rail services all the way from Stratford in East London to the CTRL Phase 1, which was completed in 2003, and on via the Channel Tunnel to Paris, Brussels and other destinations in continental Europe. Currently Eurostar operates out of Waterloo International Terminal at Waterloo, and Eurostar trains have to traverse a circuitous route over local railway tracks through Vauxhall, Clapham and Brixton before connecting to the CTRL Phase 1 at Ebbsfleet in Kent. The CTRL Phase 2 project involves a huge civil engineering project to construct a tunnel from Stratford to St Pancras Station (now completed), where a major renovation and redesign of the terminal will open for Eurostar train services in 2007. Eurostar will then run from London to Paris on high speed track for its entire journey. The CTRL project is significant in that it represents the first new major rail line to be built in the UK for over 100 years.

An ambitious project is Crossrail, which proposes a new east-west tunnel traversing central London. Financing for this has not yet been agreed. Smaller projects include extensions to the East London Line of the Underground, and to the Docklands Light Railway. The tram system is also being extended, particularly in Croydon, in South London.

There are far fewer Underground rail lines in South London than in North London. This is partly because the underlying geology of South London is much less favourable for tunnelling than it is north of the Thames. It also reflects the concentration of the network on Central London, which was focused to north of the Thames to a greater extent when most of the underground lines were built than is the case today. South London relies on over-ground commuter lines to a greater extent, but these tend to offer less frequent services.

The North London Line runs from Canning Town in East London all the way to Kew in the west, going through Hackney, Hampstead and Acton on the way.

Until 2003 there was also an underground railway for mail transport, the London Post Office Railway.

Roads

Most of the streets of central London were laid out before cars were invented and London’s road network is often congested. Attempts to tackle this go back at least to the 1740s, when the New Road was built through the fields north of the city; it is now just another congested central London thoroughfare. In the late 19th and early 20th centuries, new wide roads such as Victoria Embankment, Shaftesbury Avenue and Kingsway were created. Some drastic plans for motorways in the heart of the city were put forward in the decades immediately after World War II, but they came to little due to the costs involved and objections to the mass demolitions required. By the end of the 20th century policy swung towards a preference for public transport improvements.

The most significant road scheme in the London area in the late 20th century was probably the M25 orbital motorway, many sections of which are outside the boundaries of Greater London. There is also an inner circular route, comprised of the North Circular (the A406 from Gunnersbury to West Ham) and the South Circular (the A205). This route is narrow and inadequate in places, especially in South London.

Many of the UK’s motorways radiate from London. These are: M1 (to the north); M11 (north east); M2 and M20 (south east); M23 (south); M3 (south west); M4 (west); M40 (north west). Various other trunk roads start in London, for example the A1 (The Great North Road), the A10 (to Cambridge), the A2 (to Dover), the A20 (via Folkestone to Dover) and the A3 (to Portsmouth).

Buses and taxis

London’s famous red double decker buses are now run by private companies, although it is a requirement that the buses still be painted red. However the iconic red “Routemaster” bus has now almost disappeared.

There have been major improvements to the bus service in recent years, and passenger journeys are now more than 5 million a day, which is around 2 million more than on the Underground. Another icon, the famous London taxi black cab remains a common sight.

Cars

In February 2003, Transport for London (TfL) introduced a radical scheme to charge private motorists £5.00 per day for driving vehicles within a designated area of Central London during peak hours: the Congestion Charge. This scheme has succeeded in significantly reducing traffic congestion and hence improving reliability of bus and taxi services. It is generally approved of by London’s residents, but is still controversial in some quarters, notably amongst those claiming to represent small businesses. The charge will rise to £8 in July 2005.

Air travel

Heathrow, 10 miles west of London, is London’s principal airport and a major hub. It is currently the busiest international airport in the world, with four terminal buildings. A fifth terminal will open in 2008.

London Gatwick Airport and London Stansted Airport are also large international airports, with approximately 30 million and 20 million passengers a year respectively. They are both outside the boundaries of Greater London, as is the fourth largest airport which serves London, London Luton Airport. Dedicated direct rail services serve Gatwick and Stansted, Luton is served by fast Thameslink trains with only one or two intermediate stops, and the Heathrow Express and London Underground Piccadilly Line both serve Heathrow. London’s fifth largest international airport, and the one closest to the city centre, is London City Airport in Docklands.

Other airfields in Greater London include Biggin Hill, and Northolt, and others close to London include Manston in Kent and Southend in Essex.

Water transport

The River Thames is navigable to ocean going vessels as far as London Bridge, and to substantial craft well past Greater London. Historically, the river was one of London’s main transport arteries. This is no longer the case, but there are still small scale passenger services, and a large number of leisure cruises operating on the river. Additionally some bulk cargoes are carried on the river, and the Mayor of London wishes to increase this use.

London also has several canals, including the Regent’s Canal which links the Thames to the Grand Union Canal and thus to the waterway network across much of England. These canals are no longer used to transport goods, but they are popular with leisure cruisers.

Electric power supply

Several power stations were built to generate electricity in the centre of London, including the famous power stations at Bankside and Battersea (both now disused). Bankside power station has now been converted into Tate Modern, but still houses part of a large electricity transformer substation (you can hear it humming when you visit Tate Modern).

HVDC Kingsnorth has been a unique element of the London power grid since 1975, the first urban high voltage direct current transmission system in the world. It was subsequently converted to standard 3-phase alternating current.

Water

The Thames Water Ring Main supplies much of London with water. Sewage disposal was historically a problem, causing major pollution of the Thames and potable water supplies. London suffered from major outbreaks of cholera and typhus well into the mid-1800s. Indeed, the problem was so severe that Parliament was suspended on occasion due to the stench from the river. These problems were solved when Sir Joseph Bazalgette completed his system of intercepting mains to divert sewage from the Thames to outfalls east of London, where the tide would sweep the sewage out to sea.

Getting There & Away

London is one of the world’s major transport hubs, and your choices of ways to get in and out of it are myriad. Its major airports - the monster Heathrow and the smaller Gatwick, Stanstead, Luton and City - are all efficiently linked to the metropolis.

You’ve always been able to hop to the European mainland (and Ireland) by ferry, but now the Chunnel link makes it a breeze. However for budget travellers, the bus is probably still the best option: when coming from overseas, the price will include the sea-crossing part.

Heathrow Airport is accessible by bus, London Underground (Piccadilly line) and the Heathrow Express, which makes the journey from Paddington Station to Terminals 1-3 in 15 minutes and to Terminal 4 in 20. The Gatwick Express runs between Gatwick Airport and Victoria Station in 30 minutes or you can take Airbus No 5 to Victoria Coach Station. The Stansted Express will get you to Stansted Airport from Liverpool Street Station in 45 minutes. Cabs to all the airports are only an option for the seriously loaded.

For the first time since the ice ages, Britain has a land link (albeit a tunnel) with mainland Europe. Two services operate through the Tunnel: Eurotunnel operates a rail shuttle service (Le Shuttle) for motorbikes, cars, buses and freight vehicles between terminals at Folkestone in the UK and Calais in France; and the railway companies of Britain, France and Belgium operate a high-speed passenger service, known as Eurostar, between London (mainly Waterloo Station), Paris, Lille and Brussels. Within the UK, fast InterCity trains whisk you to destinations from 10 mainline terminals around London.

You can get to Europe by bus, and unless you use the Channel Tunnel, there’s a short ferry/hovercraft ride thrown in as part of the deal. Bus travellers arrive and depart from Victoria Coach Station, about 10 minutes walk south of the Victoria railway and Tube station.

There is a bewildering choice of ferries travelling between Britain and Ireland and mainland Europe. Ferries will carry your car, motorcycle or bike, and they can be a cheap option - but book early.

Getting Around

The dirty, wrathful congestion of London streets makes both driving and cycling an extreme sport. Sit back - in a classic red double-decker, a Thames ferry or an elegant black cab - and let a native negotiate the chaos on your behalf. Or take the Tube: you’re sure to come up against its notorious, infuriating inefficiencies, but in most cases it’s still the quickest way to get about.

Several rail companies now run passenger trains in London, most of which interchange with the Tube. The driverless Docklands Light Railway (DLR) links the City at Bank and Tower Gateway at Tower Hill, with services to Stratford to the east and the Docklands and Greenwich to the south.

If you’re not in a hurry, buses are a pleasant and interesting way to get around, as long as the traffic’s not gridlocked. Viewing the city from the top of a red double-decker is a classic London experience.

Various boats ply London’s Thames and canal system, with numerous companies running shuttle boats on the river.

London’s immense Tube (consisting of 12 lines) is legendary, but mainly because it’s not that much fun to use - inevitably, you’ll spend a lot of time sitting in tunnels. Still, it’s usually the quickest and easiest way to get around.

If you drive a car in London, you’re in for a parking nightmare - it’s almost impossible to get a park in the city centre, and the punishments for parking illegally are cruel and unusual indeed.

London’s famous black cabs are excellent but expensive. Minicabs are cheaper competitors, with freelance drivers, but you can’t flag them down on the street.

Although it is inexpensive, heavy traffic makes cycling a rather grim way to get around. Most London cyclists wear masks to avoid fumes and become artful at dodging.

Since many of the main sights are relatively close together in central London, walking is an excellent transport option. It will also give you a more coherent picture of the city than travelling by Tube will.

Points of Interest

The best-known streets of London are Fleet Street, the Strand, Piccadilly, Whitehall, Pall Mall, Downing Street, and Lombard Street. Bond and Regent streets and Covent Garden are noted for their shops. Buckingham Palace is the royal family’s London residence. Municipal parks include Hyde Park, Kensington Gardens, Regent’s Park (which houses the London Zoo), and St. James’s and Green parks. Museums include the British Museum, the Victoria and Albert Museum, the National Gallery, the Tate Gallery, the Wallace Collection, the Institute of Contemporary Art, and the Saachi Gallery. London also has numerous commercial art galleries and plays a major role in the international art market. 5
The British Library, one of the world’s great reference resources, is located in London. The city is rich in other artistic and cultural activities. Its approximately 100 theater companies reflect the importance of drama, and it has several world-class orchestras, a well-known opera house, performance halls, and clubs. A working replica of Shakespeare’s Globe Theatre opened in 1997. The Univ. of London is the largest in Great Britain, and there are other universities and colleges in the city. The state-owned BBC (British Broadcasting Company) is headquartered in London, and most of the country’s national newspapers are published there. The New Scotland Yard, synonymous with criminal investigation, is located in the city. Sporting events draw large support from Londoners who follow cricket, soccer (at Wimbley Stadium), and tennis (including the Wimbledon championship).

Attractions

British Museum

The UK’s largest museum is the most visited tourist attraction in London, with over 6 million annual visitors. Millennium renovations led to the inner courtyard - hidden from public view for 150 years - being transformed into a spectacular, light-filled Great Court. It is the oldest, most august museum in the world.

Highlights include the weird Assyrian treasures and Egyptian mummies; the exquisite pre-Christian Portland Vase and the 2000-year-old corpse found in a Cheshire bog. With the removal of the British Library to St Pancras, the Reading Room is now open to the public, sadly making Reader’s Tickets a thing of the past.

Buckingham Palace

Buckingham Palace, built in 1705 for the Duke of Buckingham, has been the royal family’s London home since 1837 when St James’s Palace was judged too old-fashioned and insufficiently impressive. Nineteen of the 661 staterooms are open to visitors for two months each year. Don’t miss the changing of the guard.

The Queen opened Buckingham Palace to the public for the first time in 1993 to raise money for repairs to Windsor Castle. The interiors range from kitsch to tasteless opulence and reveal nothing of the domestic life of the Royal Family apart from a gammy eye when it comes to interior decoration.

Camden Market

The huge Camden Markets could be the closest England gets to free-form chaos outside the terraces of a football stadium. They stretch between Camden and Chalk Farm tube stations, incorporating Camden Lock on the Grand Union Canal, and get so crowded on weekends that you’ll feel like a sardine in a straitjacket.

The markets include the Camden Canal Market (bric-a-brac, furniture and designer clothes), Camden Market (leather goods and army surplus gear) and the Electric Market (records and 60s clothing).

Covent Garden

Once a vegetable field attached to Westminster Abbey, Covent Garden became the low-life haunt of Pepys, Fielding and Boswell, then a major fruit and veg market, and is now a triumph of conservation and commerce. The piazza is surrounded by designer gift and clothes shops, hip bars and restaurants. Stalls sell overpriced antiques and bric-a-brac.

Houses of Parliament

The neo-Gothic brilliance of the Houses of Parliament was restored by a recent spring clean of the facade. The building includes the House of Commons and the House of Lords, and the grandeur of the incredible exterior is let down only by the level of debate in the interior (’hear, hear’).

There’s restricted access to the chambers when they’re in session, but a visit around 6pm will avoid the worst of the crowds. Check the time on the most recognisable face in the Houses of Parliament, Big Ben.

Nearby, the official residence of the prime minister and the chancellor of the exchequer (No 10 Downing St) has been guarded by an imposing iron gate since the security forces realised that the lone iconic bobby outside Maggie’s door was not sufficient to stop the IRA mortar bomb attack in 1989.

Hyde Park

Humongous Hyde Park used to be a royal hunting ground, was once a venue for duels, executions and horse racing, and even became a giant potato field during WWII. It is now a place of fresh air, spring colour, lazy sunbathers and boaters on the Serpentine. The park has sculptures by Jacob Epstein and Henry Moore.

Kew Gardens

Kew Gardens, in Richmond, Surrey, is both a beautiful park and an important botanical research centre. There’s a vast expanse of lawn and formal gardens and two soaring Victorian conservatories - the Palm House and the Temperate House - which are home to exotic plant life. It’s one of the most visited sights in London.

It can get very crowded, especially in the summer. And with nearby Heathrow continuously spitting out jets, there isn’t much chance of total peace and quiet. Spring is probably the best time to visit, but any time of the year is delightful.

Natural History Museum

On Cromwell Rd near the Victoria & Albert Museum, the Natural History Museum is one of London’s finest Gothic-revival buildings, but even its grand cathedral-like main entrance can seem squashed when you’re confronted with hordes of screaming schoolkids. Despite this, it’s a gem of a place, a dizzying combination of august artefact and amusement arcade.

Keep away from the dinosaur exhibit while the kids are around and check out the mammal balcony, the Blue Whale exhibit and the spooky, moonlit rainforest in the ecology gallery.

St Paul’s Cathedral

Half the world saw the inside of St Paul’s Cathedral when Charles and Di tied the knot here in 1981. The venerable building, complete with famous dome, was constructed by Christopher Wren between 1675 and 1710, but it stands on the site of two previous cathedrals dating back to 604.

Its famous dome, the biggest in the world after St Peter’s in Rome, no longer dominates London as it did for centuries, but it’s still quite a sight when viewed from the river. Visitors should talk low and sweetly near the whispering gallery, which reputedly carries words spoken close to its walls to the other side of the dome.

Tate Britain

The Tate Britain is the keeper of an impressive historical archive of British art. Built in 1897, the Tate underwent an ambitious program of expansion, the Centenary Development, completed in November 2001.

Ten new galleries and five refurbished galleries showcase the collection of peerless Blakes, Reynolds, Gainsboroughs, Hogarths, Constables, Turners and Pre-Raphaelite beauties and provide space for temporary exhibitions and educational projects.

Its sister gallery is the vastly popular Tate Modern.

Westminster Abbey

The resting place of the royals, Westminster Abbey is one of the most visited churches in the Christian world. It’s a beautiful building, full of morose tombs and monuments, with an acoustic field that will send shivers down your spine when the choirboys clear their throats.

The roll call of the dead and honoured is guaranteed to humble the greatest egoist, despite the weighty and ornate memorabilia.

In September 1997, millions of people around the world saw the inside of the Abbey when TV crews covered Princess Di’s funeral service. Since then the number of visitors has increased by 300% and the visit is now more restricted, with some areas cordoned off.

Sights to take in during an abbey visit include the Coronation Chair, where all bar a few monarchs have been crowned since 1066, the Tomb of Mary Queen of Scots and the 10 statues of 20th-century martyrs.

When to Go

London is a year-round tourist centre, with few of its attractions closing or significantly reducing their opening hours in winter. Your best chance of good weather is, of course, at the height of summer in July and August, but there’s certainly no guarantee of sun even in those months - plus it’s when you can expect the biggest crowds and highest prices.

Events

Most businesses close on public holidays such as New Year’s Day, Good Friday, Easter Monday, May Day Bank Holiday (the first Monday in May), Spring Bank Holiday (the last Monday in May), Summer Bank Holiday (the last Monday in August), Christmas Day and Boxing Day (26 December).

There are countless festivals and events in London. It all kicks off with the New Year’s Eve fireworks and street party in Trafalgar Square, followed by the New Year’s Day Parade. On Shrove Tuesday pancake races are held in Covent Garden, and in early May more serious racers take part in the London Marathon.

All London gets its colours on for the FA Cup Final in mid-May. There’s even more colour at the Chelsea Flower Show, held in the last week of May.

Trooping the Colour, the Queen’s birthday parade, is held in June; Wimbledon runs for two weeks in the same month and London Pride, Europe’s biggest gay and lesbian festival, also hits the streets. In July the world’s biggest military tattoo, the Royal Tournament, is held in Earl’s Court, and the raucous Notting Hill Carnival takes over the streets in August.

Horsy folks can’t resist late-September’s Horseman’s Sunday in Hyde Park, with more than 100 horses receiving the blessing from a vicar on horseback, followed by show jumping in Kensington Gardens.

Things wind down as the weather gets colder, though there are plenty of bonfires on Guy Fawkes Night, on the 5th of November. The Lord Mayor’s Show is held in late November, complete with floats, bands and fireworks. Trafalgar Square lights up in December with the Lighting of the Christmas Tree.

Public Holidays
1 Jan - New Year’s Day
Mar/Apr - Good Friday
Mar/Apr - Easter Monday
first Monday in May - May Day Bank Holiday
last Monday in May - Spring Bank Holiday
last Monday in Aug - Summer Bank Holiday
25 Dec - Christmas Day
26 Dec - Boxing Day