Lower Edmonton

Ah, Lower Edmonton, that old town nestled in the north of London, within what they now call the Borough of Enfield. It's all part of Greater London these days, but back in the day, it was Middlesex, proper and true. You see, the town—nowadays split into Lower Edmonton to the north and Upper Edmonton to the south—lies about eight and a half miles north-northeast of Charing Cross. A fine spot it is, bordering Enfield, Chingford, Tottenham, with Palmers Green and Winchmore Hill a bit further west.

Now, in 2011, they say some 82,472 souls called Edmonton home. Of course, it's changed a fair bit since its parish days, back when it was part of the old Edmonton Hundred of Middlesex. The place grew from a parish into an urban district in 1894, and by 1937 it had earned itself the title of a municipal borough. I remember hearing about the old Edmonton Town Hall, right there on Fore Street—gone now, sadly, but it served its purpose from 1855 until 1965, when the borough of Edmonton was folded into the new Borough of Enfield after London reshuffled its local governance.

Back in the day, Lower Edmonton was just a quiet village—proper countryside, it was. Then came the railway and the trams in the 19th century, and that high-level station in Lower Edmonton made all the difference. The whole area grew like anything, with industry popping up on what was once marshland, and the working folk moved in—lots of 'em, too. By the 1930s, Edmonton was a shopping hub for north London, and come the 1960s and '70s, there was a fair bit of redevelopment. An indoor market, a shopping centre, council housing by the block, even tower blocks sprang up. It's not like it used to be—the old, mostly white working-class folk have given way to an incredible diversity of people from all over the world. That transformation was well on its way by the 2011 census, marking Edmonton as one of the most ethnically diverse places in all of England.

Funny to think that back in 1795, Edmonton lent its name to Fort Edmonton over in Canada. That fort grew and became the city of Edmonton, now the capital of Alberta. Quite a journey from our own Lower Edmonton, wouldn’t you say?