51-399: Norbury is an area of south London . It shares the postcode London SW16 with neighbouring Streatham . Norbury is 6.7 miles (10.8 km) south of Charing Cross . The name Norbury derives from North Burh , (North Borough). Some local histories note that this was due to Norbury's position on the northern boundary of the former Manor of Croydon . Others state that it takes its name from
102-515: A cheaper alternative for 17 miles (27 kilometres) of its routes in 1931. A Royal Commission on Transport, held between 1928 and 1931, ensured that the tram companies retained complete responsibility for the maintenance of its rails and highway, which was shared with other road users who contributed its wear. But this was accompanied by Parliamentary bills in 1930 and 1933 that set up the London Passenger Transport Board to operate
153-557: A condition of approval. After the War, money for investment and maintenance became harder to find, as passengers migrated to the new motor bus services. In the 1930s, The London United and Metropolitan Electric companies purchased a large fleet of modern double-deck Feltham trams , built by the Union Construction Company at Feltham . LUT accompanied this change by introducing electric trolleybuses using twin overhead wires as
204-533: A demonstration line was built at the Crystal Palace , the first lines authorised by the Act of Parliament in 1870 ran from: The new tram companies all adopted the same standard gauge, with the intention of being able to link up services at later dates. Horse tram lines soon opened all over London, typically using two horses to pull a 60-person car. They proved popular as they were cheaper, smoother, roomier and safer than
255-592: A large proportion of the trams and of the tracks and ancillary equipment were nearing the end of their useful life. Replacement continued until hostilities stopped the conversion programme in June 1940, leaving only the South London trams and the routes that went through the Kingsway subway into North London. After World War II , shortages of steel and electrical machinery were cited as reasons for not investing in maintenance, while
306-449: A more comprehensive list of reasons for their demise, including: The capital cost of replacing and updating the worn-out infrastructure and trams was also seen as prohibitive when compared with the £9 m capital cost of buying buses with a slightly smaller carrying capacity. "Operation Tramaway", the replacement of the tram service by diesel buses, was announced in July 1950 by Lord Latham of
357-872: A pedestrian only route, the South Kensington subway, was built instead. The Kingsway tramway subway did go ahead - this started in 1902 going from Theobalds Road to the Victoria Embankment. In the 1930s, the arched tunnels were removed to accommodate double decker trams. The last tram using the subway system ran on the night of 5/6 April 1952. After the slow start, electric trams rapidly became very popular; by 1903, there were 300 electric tramcars in London, which carried 800,000 passengers over Whitsun weekend in 1903. The London County Council Tramways first electric line opened in May 1903 between Westminster Bridge and Tooting and
408-513: A split in the borough of Bensham, one of the former seven boroughs of Croydon. "Northbenchesham" became the Northborough, then Norbury; "Southbenchesham" later became Thornton Heath . For most of its history Norbury was rural countryside through which the London to Brighton Way Roman road passed. At Hepworth Road, the intact road, 32 feet wide, was excavated in 1961. Remnants of a metalled ford across
459-414: A year, proved successful and attracted large crowds from London. To cater for the crowds, Norbury railway station opened in 1878, built on a railway line which had run through Norbury since 1862. The increased crowds however led to an increase in anti-social behaviour, and local residents lobbied politicians to enact a new law in 1879 banning horse racing within ten miles of Westminster , effectively ending
510-650: Is White British (24.1%). Of those living in Norbury, the most common place of birth is England (55%), followed by India (5%), Pakistan (4%), Jamaica (4%) and Kenya (2%). The main first language spoken is English (76.5%), followed by Polish (4%), Urdu (3.3%) and Gujarati (2.8%). The largest religious groupings are Christians (52 per cent), then Muslims (17.8 per cent), those of no religion (12.6 per cent), Hindus (7.6 per cent), no response (7.6 per cent), Sikhs (0.9 per cent), other (0.8 per cent), Buddhists (0.5 per cent) and Jews (0.1 per cent). Norbury
561-473: Is divided into the City of London and 32 London boroughs , the result of amalgamation of earlier units of administration that can be traced back to ancient parishes . Each borough is made up of many smaller areas that are variously called districts, neighbourhoods, suburbs, towns or villages. John Strype 's map of 1720 describes London as consisting of four parts: The City of London , Westminster , Southwark and
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#1732852354698612-422: Is in fare zone 3 . Some locals consider the area to be in decline, with increased fly-tipping and anti-social behaviour, and a campaign has been started to reverse these changes. In the 2011 census , Norbury was White or White British (37.4%), Asian or Asian British (28%), Black or Black British (24.8%), Mixed/multiple ethnic groups (6.5%), and Other ethnic group (2.2%). The largest single ethnicity
663-599: Is part of the Croydon North constituency and the current MP is the Labour politician Steve Reed . The constituency replaced the Croydon North East constituency in 1997 and has returned Labour Party MPs since it was re-instated. Norbury includes two of the twenty-eight wards which make up Croydon London Borough Council . These two wards, both created in 2018, are Norbury and Pollards Hill and Norbury Park . Norbury
714-572: Is portrayed in a Sherlock Holmes short story, " The Adventure of the Yellow Face ", as one of the few places in which the detective turned out to be wrong regarding his theories (as referenced in the episode " The Six Thatchers " of the BBC television series Sherlock ). Norbury is mentioned in Penelope Fitzgerald 's The Beginning of Spring (1988). The character of Nellie Reid, who is central to
765-608: Is referred to as the "lands stretching out either side of the London Road". In 1269 the Manor comprised 91 acres of arable land in Pollards Hill , 30 acres in Grandon , 55 acres of pasture, 36 acres of heathland, 2 acres of woodland and 17 acres of meadow land. In 1337, Norbury Manor was granted to Nicolas de Carew, who also held neighbouring Beddington Manor . The Carew family remained Lords of
816-580: The City of London and the West End of London never gave permission for tram lines to be built, trams were allowed to use the Victoria Embankment and cross the Thames over Westminster and Blackfriars Bridges ; on 14 September 1909, Lord Mayor George Wyatt Truscott opened the widened Blackfriars Bridge and drove the first tram across it. By 1914, the London tram operators formed the largest tram network in Europe but
867-608: The London Transport Executive . Retirement started in October 1950 and London's final first-generation trams ran in the early hours of 6 July 1952 to a rousing reception at New Cross Depot. No general improvement in traffic flow was seen after the trams were withdrawn. During the closure cycle of London's tram system, almost 100 of the most modern trams known as the "Feltham" class and dating from 1931 were withdrawn and sold to Leeds where they continued in service until
918-582: The New Works Programme . Although the trams returned gross annual revenues of £850,000 (equivalent to £67,878,452 in 2023), , the net surplus was £128,000 (equivalent to £10,221,696 in 2023), after costs were taken by the LCC, partly to repay the debt of £18m resulting from the merger. At this time, trams were starting to be considered out-dated and inflexible and the phasing-out and replacement by diesel buses or trolleybuses started in earnest around 1935, when
969-534: The 1870 Tramways Act which had held back previous private tram companies. However, as most of the routes affected were managed by the same authority, the obligation to maintain the road surface was not a new cost. Tramlink operates with modern articulated tramcars of Bombardier low-floor design called CR4000 , based upon the K4000 type of the Cologne Stadtbahn , with the tram units numbered from 2530. This number
1020-539: The 1948 nationalisation of electricity suppliers removed access to cheap electricity for those undertakings which owned their local power company. Alexander Valentine , one of the five full-time members of the London Transport Executive , saw trams as a major cause of road congestion , which would be relieved by the introduction of buses, with the aesthetic benefit of doing away with overhead wires and their noisy operation. A report in The Economist in 1952 suggested
1071-481: The LCC reported that the service ran at a loss. On 15 November 1946 the London Passenger Transport Board announced that the remaining trams in London would be replaced by diesel buses, stated as being "eminently flexible and much cheaper". (London Transport Tramways Handbook, Willoughby and Oakley 1972). The market for trams became smaller as other tramways were being forced to close at that time, as
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#17328523546981122-436: The LCC sold 3.3 million tickets in its third year of business, five times the traffic carried by its horse trams. The LCC saw the electric trams as a way of driving social change, as its cheap, fast service could encourage workers to move out of the crowded inner city and live healthier lives in the suburbs. Soon other London boroughs introduced their own electric services, including West Ham, Leyton, Dartford and Bexley. Although
1173-522: The LCC's existing bus and London Underground service and to purchase and manage all of London's tramways. Under the LPTB, there was no new investment in tram services and the maintenance of services became a hot political issue in elections in South London, an area poorly served by Underground trains. The merged tram services were held back from introducing new, quieter and more comfortable track and vehicles, in favour of trolleybus services and tubes provided under
1224-492: The London Road. A second villa followed in 1878, and thereafter followed the construction of clusters of large villas along both sides of the London Road. In 1867, the Committee of Croydon Steeple Chase and Hurdle Races leased approximately 100 acres at Lonesome Farm. The following year, the first Streatham Horse Race meeting was held and a temporary grandstand was built on Northborough Road. The two day meets, held four or five times
1275-514: The Manor of Norbury until 1859 except for a brief interlude during the reign of Henry VIII . Norbury remained rural and agricultural throughout this period. By 1800 most of the land in Norbury was owned by a handful of people; approximately half was owned by the Carew family, and the remaining large landowners were Peter du Cane, Croydon Hospital and Pembroke College . At the start of the Victorian period,
1326-574: The Middle Ages." London boroughs are the result of amalgamations of hundreds of ancient parishes that date from at least the 12th century and are in some cases based on earlier manors . Download coordinates as: These are the areas of London that are variously described as districts, neighbourhoods, suburbs, towns or villages. Trams in London There have been two separate generations of trams in London , from 1860 to 1952 and from 2000 to
1377-488: The Streatham Races. By 1900, Norbury was an affluent semi-rural suburb boasting two golf courses and cricket, football, tennis and bowls clubs. The first shopping parades on the London Road were constructed in 1900 and side roads behind the parades began to be laid out. Electric trams were introduced in 1901 connecting the town to Purley , however as Croydon trams and London trams used different systems and could not use
1428-668: The abandonment of that city's trams in 1959. Some London tramcars have been preserved on static display at London's Transport Museum (in Covent Garden) and in working order at the National Tramway Museum at Crich, Derbyshire. A working London tram can also be seen and ridden on at the East Anglia Transport Museum in Carlton Colville near Lowestoft , Suffolk . The current generation of trams started with
1479-707: The competing Omnibus or Hackney carriages . Replacement by electric vehicles commenced in 1901; the last horse-drawn trams were withdrawn in 1915. There were several early attempts to run motor-powered trams on the London tramlines: John Grantham first trialled an experimental 23-foot (7.0 m) steam tramcar in London in 1873 but withdrew it after it performed poorly. From 1885, the North London Tramways Company operated 25 Merryweather and Dick, Kerr steam engines hauling long-wheelbase Falcon Engine & Car Works trailers, until its liquidation in 1891. Although several towns and cities adopted steam trams,
1530-587: The eastern 'That Part Beyond the Tower'. As London expanded, it absorbed many hundreds of existing towns and villages which continued to assert their local identities. Mark Twain described London in 1896 as "fifty villages massed solidly together over a vast stretch of territory". Steen Eiler Rasmussen observed in 1934 that "London became a greater and still greater accumulation of towns, an immense colony of dwellings where people still live in their own home in small communities with local government just as they had done in
1581-467: The first cottage estate built by the London County Council . The population of Norbury had risen from 475 people in 1901 to 15,538 by 1931. During the second half of the twentieth century, many of the large Victorian villas were demolished and office blocks were built on their sites. Later many of the office blocks were themselves converted into residential apartments. In 1970 Norbury Fire Station
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1632-862: The new estate being constructed at New Addington. This was based on the fact that the Feltham cars used in Croydon were going to Leeds to serve their new estates on reserved tracks. In 1962 a private study, with assistance from BR engineers, showed how easy it was to convert the West Croydon - Wimbledon train service to tram operation and successfully prevent conflict between trams and trains. These two concepts became joined in joint LRTL/TLRS concept of New Addington to Wimbledon every 15 mins via East and West Croydon and Mitcham plus New Addington to Tattenham Corner every 15 mins via East and West Croydon, Sutton and Epsom Downs. A branch into Forestdale to give an overlap service from Sutton
1683-410: The onset of World War I saw a halt in the expansion of the trams and thousands of conductors left to join the armed forces to be replaced by "substitute" women conductors known as 'conductorettes' (A tram driver, like an omnibus driver, was deemed as a reserved occupation as it was considered that women did not have the physical capability of operating the heavy electrical controller or the brakes. Also,
1734-612: The opening of Tramlink in 2000. Croydon previously had many tramlines. The first to close was Addiscombe – East Croydon Station route through George Street to Cherry Orchard Road in 1927 and the last Purley - Embankment and Croydon (Coombe Road) - Thornton Heath routes closed in April 1951. However, in spring 1950, the Highways Committee was presented by the Mayor with the concept of running trams between East Croydon station and
1785-573: The plot, but who does not appear until the book's final sentence, is from Norbury; and it is repeatedly mentioned throughout the book in contrast to a very different type of life in Moscow. Norbury station features in the song "Lesley", from rapper Dave 's debut album Psychodrama (2019). List of areas of London London is the capital of and largest city in England and the United Kingdom . It
1836-624: The population consisted of fifty six people and three main dwellings; the Hermitage, Norbury Manor Farm House and Norbury Hall. The Hermitage was situated alongside Green Lane and backed onto Hermitage Sports Ground (now Norbury Park). The last resident of The Hermitage was Jenny Hill , a famous music hall performer in the 1890s. In 1894 the North Surrey Golf Club built a 90-acre golf club on Hermitage Sports Ground and in 1896 purchased The Hermitage to use as their club house. The following year it
1887-519: The present. There were no trams at all in London between 1952 and 2000. The first generation of trams in London started in March 1861 when a horse tramway began operating between Marble Arch and Notting Hill Gate . This was followed a month later by a route along Victoria Street in Westminster . These first lines were operated by an American entrpreneur, George Francis Train . Initially, there
1938-631: The problems associated with track weight, acceleration, noise and power held back their general acceptance in London. Between 1881 and 1883, a small number of trams powered by compressed air were trialled on the Caledonian Road tramway. In 1884, a cable tram was introduced for Highgate Hill , the first cable tramway in Europe, which was followed by a second cable line to draw trams up Brixton Hill to Streatham . Both these systems were replaced within 15 years by electric trams. The electric tram took some decades to establish itself in London. After
1989-444: The rails were recessed into the carriageway and that the tramways were shared with other road users. Costs of maintenance of the tramway and its immediate neighbouring road carriageway would be borne by the tram companies, thus benefiting the ratepayers, who had been bearing the full cost of highway repairs since the abolition of turnpikes . Fares were set at 1d (1 penny) per mile, with half-price early and late workmen's services. After
2040-471: The same tracks, when going to London passengers had to change in Norbury. During the next thirty years most of the housing in Norbury was constructed, with the houses and roads in different areas forming part of several residential estates. The most notable estate was the Norbury Cottage Garden Estate built in 1901 in thirty acres of land between Northborough Road and Semley Road, and which was
2091-542: The scheme was brought out into the open, and Scott Mackintosh was appointed Light Rail Manager in 1989. The scheme was accepted in principle in February 1990 by Croydon Council , which worked with what was then London Regional Transport (LRT) to propose Tramlink to Parliament, resulting in the Croydon Tramlink Act 1994 giving LRT the legal power to build and run Tramlink. The new Act still incorporated major parts of
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2142-534: The storage battery was invented, an electric tram was tested on the West Metropolitan Tramways line between Acton and Kew in 1883 but it was not until 1901 that Croydon Corporation introduced the first fully operational electric tram services in the Greater London area, using power delivered from overhead wires. Meanwhile, Imperial Tramways, under the directorship of James Clifton Robinson, had acquired
2193-608: The stream were found further south at Hermitage Bridge on the River Graveney which forms part of the boundary between Norbury and Streatham, before flowing on to the River Wandle , then the River Thames . By the early thirteenth century, Norbury was a sub-manor within the chief manor of Croydon. The first recorded mention of Norbury Manor was in 1229 when Peter de Bendings conveyed the Manor to John de Kemsing and his wife Idonea and
2244-618: The suburbs, assisted by facilities like the Kingsway tramway subway , which enabled the longest tram route entirely within the County of London to operate: a weekend service between Archway , then part of Highgate , and Downham via Brockley , 16 miles (26 kilometres). Route coverage might have been wider still but the terms of the 1870 Act meant that the passage of new tramways had to be negotiated individually with local authorities, who would sometimes impose prohibitively expensive improvement works as
2295-663: The tram driver was in an exposed position as the trams did not have windscreens , because the Metropolitan Police considered them dangerous). Several different companies and municipalities operated London's electric tramways. The largest was the LCC, with lines equipped with conduit current collection . Other operators mainly used the more conventional overhead electric wires. Many of London's trams had to be equipped with both systems of electricity supply, with routes being equipped with change points. During their heyday, tram services covered much of inner London and reached out to
2346-598: The worn-out tram network in West London, which it renovated and extended from Shepherds Bush to Acton, Ealing, Chiswick and Uxbridge, as the London United Tramways Company, using overhead electrification throughout and its own network of ornate power stations, starting with Chiswick. There were plans to run an underground tram line between South Kensington and the Albert Hall but it was withdrawn in 1891 and
2397-565: Was also included. During the 1970s, several BR directors and up-and-coming managers were aware of the advantages. In fact, Peter Parker was very well aware of this even before becoming chairman. Chris Green, upon becoming managing director, Network South East, published his plans in 1987 expanding the concept to take in the Tattenham Corner and Caterham branches and provide a service from Croydon to Lewisham via Addiscombe and Hayes. Working with Tony Ridley, then managing director, London Transport,
2448-431: Was built to replace nearby Streatham Fire Station. Today, Norbury is a built-up residential area housing a diverse and multi-cultural community. It has a variety of local commerce, with most of Norbury High Street consisting of newsagents and various independent businesses, as well as one or two pubs. It is also very well connected to other areas, such as Crystal Palace, Croydon, Streatham and Central London. Norbury Station
2499-469: Was destroyed by fire. Norbury Manor Farm House was situated on the corner where Norbury Avenue meets Kensington Avenue and was the Norbury Manor House until Norbury Hall was built in 1802. The Farm House was demolished in 1914. Only Norbury Hall remains, now used as a retirement home and protected as a Grade II listed building . In 1859, the first Victorian villa, known as Norbury Villa, was built on
2550-460: Was strong opposition as, although it was popular with its passengers, the first designs had rails that stood proud of the road surface and created an obstruction for other traffic. This came to a head in 1861 when Train was arrested for "breaking and injuring" the Uxbridge Road and his plans were put on hold. Eventually Parliament passed legislation permitting tram services, on the condition that
2601-399: Was the next in sequence from the last London tram, number 2529, withdrawn in 1952. Since it opened on 11 May 2000, the 38 km of track have been operated by FirstGroup on behalf of Transport for London on three routes across South London. It features accessible low platforms that match the 350 mm high car floor or tram stops at the same height as the pavement. Much of the track
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