Talk:London metropolitan area

Numerous changes
I think we should delete the table in the Environs of Greater London section as it's source is a dead link and other tables such as the table which shows English districts considered parts of London's Larger Urban Zone.

There are currently three sources which are used to show what towns, cities and districts are part of the Commuter Belt. I have linked the three sources here.  I dont think the Demographia one is a good source to show what is in the Commuter Belt and it's population as it adds up all counties adjacent to the greenbelt for it's population of the commuter belt and so I believe it is an over-estimate as the whole of Essex is in Demographia's London Metro Area. Whilst other sources break it down so not the whole county is in the Metro Area. Demographia isnt currently used as a source to show what's in the commuter belt but it is used to show the Commuter Belt's population here and in the London article. I think that should be changed. ESPON one of the sources for what is in the metro area gives a similiar albeit lower by 200,000 population for the commuter belt and specifies better than Demographia what is contained in it. I believe that should be used as a source instead or World Gazetteer's one but I find think that site's reliability is in question although it is currently used on numerous Wikipedia articles. I think more sources should be found as to what constitutes the London Commuter Belt. Even though the term is very subjective and has varying definitions.

Your opinions on what the London Commuter Belt constitutes may also be useful. I think it incorporates these parts of the following home counties: Bedfordshire (Luton), Berkshire (Slough, Reading, Wokingham, Maidenhead, Eton and Windsor), Sussex (Crawley, Horsham, East Grinstead), Pretty much all of Hertfordshire except the most North Eastern parts, the parts of Surrey which are in the Greater London Urban Area plus Guildford and Godalming, Buckinghamshire( Amersham, Chesham and High Wycombe), the south of Essex stretching to Southend on Sea (excluding Chelmsford) the Aldershot Urban Area and western parts of Kent (Sevenoaks, Tonbridge, Royal Tunbridge Wells, Medway, Maidstone). This means I believe it includes all the major airports with London in their name. My above list includes Reading and Luton both large towns with their own commuters they are considered parts of the Commuter Belt according to ESPON, so is this evidence of this Commuter Belt being polynuclear (having more than one centre)? Or are they not parts of the belt they aren't included in the Larger Urban Zone according to Eurostat. But there is a lot of developed land between London and these two large towns.

Adding a map of the Commuter Belt showing urban land around the capital or the Green Belt surrounding London would also be useful. The current maps show too small an area. Also I propose we remove one of the existing maps as there are two which show urban land spreading outside the capitals borders but one shows the dialling code also. Eopsid (talk) 17:27, 9 December 2011 (UTC)

Im going to remove one of the near identical maps used on this page also the map showing the Travel To Work Area needs updating as it appears to show the data from 1991 which is more than 20 years out of date. A useful link regarding the Travel to Work Area is here. Eopsid (talk) 13:45, 13 February 2012 (UTC)

Reading/Wokingham
The text says that Reading/Wokingham urban area is not included, but the template attached says it is. Anyone care to resolve? --John Maynard Friedman (talk) 15:25, 28 March 2012 (UTC)


 * It's not included in the Larger Urban Zone but is in other definitions such as this one both definitions are talked about in this article and the wider one is used for the Template. Eopsid (talk) 16:48, 28 March 2012 (UTC)
 * Then surely the article and the template should say the same thing? It's either true or it isn't! --John Maynard Friedman (talk) 22:18, 28 March 2012 (UTC)
 * There's different definitions for the metropolitan area so it's true for some definitions and not for others. The article does says the Reading/Wokingham urban area is included under the urban areas in the commuter belt section. Eopsid (talk) 09:40, 29 March 2012 (UTC)

Greater South East
Why does this synonym keep getting removed? MRSC (talk) 16:22, 29 July 2013 (UTC)


 * This article is about London's metropolitan area. According to Google the Greater South East seems to be either South East England, East of England and London put together or some poorly defined megalopolis. What follows is the definition of the Greater South East according to one of the sources you gave.


 * "it consists of London and its immediate commuter catchment, stretching approximately 40 km. from central London, together with fifty other cities and towns and their individual catchments, ranging in population size from 600 000 down to 80 000, and extending as far as 180 km from London."


 * That clearly shows the Greater South East term refers to more than just the London Commuter Belt as it includes the commuter belts of fifty other towns and cites. Eopsid (talk) 16:38, 29 July 2013 (UTC)

Wider commuter area
A significant number of people commute daily from further afield (south coast, Birmingham, Peterborough for example) and weekly from even further. See Mind the Gap (documentary) for example. We should cover this. All the best: Rich Farmbrough, 12:24, 11 June 2014 (UTC).

External links modified
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External links modified
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I have just modified 3 external links on London commuter belt. Please take a moment to review my edit. If you have any questions, or need the bot to ignore the links, or the page altogether, please visit this simple FaQ for additional information. I made the following changes:
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 * Added archive https://web.archive.org/web/20080527193714/http://www.london.gov.uk/assembly/reports/plansd/london_regional_200104.pdf to http://www.london.gov.uk/assembly/reports/plansd/london_regional_200104.pdf
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Controversial page move
Please undo this page move and propose an RtM to seek consensus. London Commuter Belt and London Metropolitan area are two entirely different things. The RS for the metro area is (to me anyway) the Office of National Statistics Built-up area. Eithere way, the commuter belt for London is much larger than the metro area. WP:OR I admit but if we take the commuter belt as anywhere within a one-hour train journey, that takes in Swindon, Oxford, Rugby, Northampton, Peterborough, Cambridge etc etc, all well outside the metro area. --John Maynard Friedman (talk) 20:34, 4 October 2019 (UTC)

Infobox
If an infobox is needed, surely it should use Infobox UK place rather than the horrible "settlement" one? --𝕁𝕄𝔽 (talk) 07:56, 3 March 2023 (UTC)

Outdated data
From what I can tell the main page uses extremely outdated data from 2012, which will have gotten its data from the 2001 UK Government Census, since the 2011 UK Census results hadn't been published yet (were published in 2013). That means the population statistics are about 22 years out of date.

According to the London Authority the population for the Greater London area described in the article (all the way to the Green Belt) was 18,868,800 in 2011, we should take a look at the latest UK Government Census statistics from 2021 which were just published publicly this year by the Office for National Statistics in 2023 to revise the numbers.

Given that the population growth has been well over 2.2 million people a year for the past decade for just this region alone (which no slow down due to Brexit, an increase actually), it's likely to be a cumulative total well over 25 million people by now (March 2023). Kastenbrust (talk) 16:52, 24 March 2023 (UTC)