Royal Borough of Greenwich
The Royal Borough of Greenwich is a London borough in south-east London, England. Taking its name from the historic town of Greenwich, the London Borough of Greenwich was formed in 1965 by the amalgamation of the former area of the Metropolitan Borough of Greenwich with part of the Metropolitan Borough of Woolwich to the east; the local council is Greenwich London Borough Council. The council's offices are based in Woolwich, the main urban centre in the borough. Greenwich is world-famous as the traditional location of the Prime Meridian, on which all Coordinated Universal Time is based; the Prime Meridian running through Greenwich and the Greenwich Observatory is where the designation Greenwich Mean Time, or GMT began, on which all world times are based. In 2012, Greenwich was listed as a top ten global destination by Frommer's – the only UK destination to be listed. Greenwich was one of six host boroughs for the 2012 London Olympics and events were held at the Royal Artillery Barracks, Greenwich Park and The O2 – the former Millennium Dome.
It is the home borough of professional football club Charlton Athletic. To mark the Diamond Jubilee of Elizabeth II, Greenwich became a Royal Borough on 3 February 2012, due in part to its historic links with the Royal Family, to its UNESCO World Heritage Site status as home of the Prime Meridian; the London Borough of Greenwich was formed in 1965 by merging the former areas of the metropolitan boroughs of Greenwich and most of Woolwich. The name'Charlton' was considered for the borough. Greenwich once was turned down. If the application had been accepted the borough would have been known as the City of Greenwich to the City of Westminster. To mark the Diamond Jubilee of Elizabeth II, on 3 February 2012 Greenwich became the fourth Royal Borough, an honour additional to its historic links with the Royal Family, its status as home of the Prime Meridian and as a UNESCO World Heritage Site; the borough lies along the south bank of the River Thames between Thamesmead. It has an area of 5,044 hectares.
Because of the bends of the river, its waterfront is as long as 8.5 miles. Travelling south away from the waterfront, the ground rises: Shooters Hill in the east and the high ground of Blackheath in the west bookend the borough, Eltham to the south of these hills falls away slightly. Greenwich is bounded by the London Boroughs of Bexley to the east, Bromley to the south, Lewisham to the west and across the River Thames to the north lie Tower Hamlets and Barking and Dagenham; the borough's population in 2011 was 254,557. 52.3% of the community defined themselves as white British. The largest minority groups represented were of Asian heritage. Central Greenwich Town contains a UNESCO World Heritage Site centred on Christopher Wren's Royal Naval College and the Old Royal Observatory; the 2013/14 Mayor was Cllr Angela Cornforth. The 2014/15 Mayor was Cllr M Hayes; the 2015/16 Mayor was Cllr Norman Adams. The 2016/17 Mayor is Cllr Olu Babatola, the first African born individual to be elected to the office.
Shaped like an astrolabe, the 18ct gold badge on the Mayor's chain embodies the ‘time-ball’ on the principal building of the old Greenwich Royal Observatory, the meridian line and lines of latitude and longitude. The ‘time-ball’ is set with small rubies; the Executive is composed of ten Labour members, led by Cllr Danny Thorpe, Leader of the Council since 2018. Arms were granted to the London Borough by letters patent dated 1 October 1965. Although much of the 1965 design has been retained, the arms have been altered in 2012 by the addition of a representation of the Thames. In addition a crest and supporters were added to the arms; the Royal Borough of Greenwich is twinned with: – Reinickendorf, Germany. The initiative of the twinning with this Berlin borough dates from the times of the Metropolitan Borough of Woolwich. A London telephone box and a red pillar box beside Lake Tegel were gifted by Greenwich borough. A Berlin Buddy Bear in General Gordon Square commemorates the 50th anniversary of the twinning.
– Maribor, Slovenia. The 50th anniversary of the town twinning with Slovenia's second largest city was celebrated with a ballet performance in Woolwich Town Hall and the revealing of a plaque in the renamed Maribor Park in the Royal Arsenal. – Tema, Ghana. The town twinning with Tema has led to the opening of Tema's first Information Technology Centre, the gifting of a mobile ICT learning centre to Tema, the shipping of a converted Greenwich council passenger services bus, packed with books for school libraries and second-hand computers, as well as regular youth exchanges between Greenwich and Tema. Greenwich London Borough Council comprises 51 councillors; the Labour Party has an overall majority on the council, holding 43 seats, with the Conservatives holding 8. Labour has had a majority on the council since 1971. There are 17 wards in Greenwich: Abbey Wood Blackheath-Westcombe Charlton Coldharbour and New Eltham Eltham North Eltham South Eltham West Glyndon Greenwich West Peninsula Kidbrooke with Hornfair Middlepark and Sutcliffe Plumstead Shooters Hill Thamesmead Moorings Woolwich Common Woolwich Riverside The borough contains the constituencies of: Eltham Erith and Thamesmead Greenwich and WoolwichSince the 2010 General Election, all three are represented by Labour MPs. Greenwich Community College is the main publicly funded provider of furth
London Underground
The London Underground is a public rapid transit system serving London and some parts of the adjacent counties of Buckinghamshire and Hertfordshire in the United Kingdom. The Underground has its origins in the Metropolitan Railway, the world's first underground passenger railway. Opened in January 1863, it is now part of the Metropolitan lines; the network has expanded to 11 lines, in 2017/18 carried 1.357 billion passengers, making it the world's 11th busiest metro system. The 11 lines collectively handle up to 5 million passengers a day; the system's first tunnels were built just below the surface. The system has 250 miles of track. Despite its name, only 45% of the system is underground in tunnels, with much of the network in the outer environs of London being on the surface. In addition, the Underground does not cover most southern parts of Greater London, with fewer than 10% of the stations located south of the River Thames; the early tube lines owned by several private companies, were brought together under the "UndergrounD" brand in the early 20th century and merged along with the sub-surface lines and bus services in 1933 to form London Transport under the control of the London Passenger Transport Board.
The current operator, London Underground Limited, is a wholly owned subsidiary of Transport for London, the statutory corporation responsible for the transport network in Greater London. As of 2015, 92% of operational expenditure is covered by passenger fares; the Travelcard ticket was introduced in 1983 and Oyster, a contactless ticketing system, in 2003. Contactless card payments were introduced in 2014, the first public transport system in the world to do so; the LPTB was a prominent patron of art and design, commissioning many new station buildings and public artworks in a modernist style. The schematic Tube map, designed by Harry Beck in 1931, was voted a national design icon in 2006 and now includes other TfL transport systems such as the Docklands Light Railway, London Overground and Tramlink. Other famous London Underground branding includes the roundel and Johnston typeface, created by Edward Johnston in 1916; the idea of an underground railway linking the City of London with the urban centre was proposed in the 1830s, the Metropolitan Railway was granted permission to build such a line in 1854.
To prepare construction, a short test tunnel was built in 1855 in Kibblesworth, a small town with geological properties similar to London. This test tunnel was used for two years in the development of the first underground train, was in 1861, filled up; the world's first underground railway, it opened in January 1863 between Paddington and Farringdon using gas-lit wooden carriages hauled by steam locomotives. It was hailed as a success, carrying 38,000 passengers on the opening day, borrowing trains from other railways to supplement the service; the Metropolitan District Railway opened in December 1868 from South Kensington to Westminster as part of a plan for an underground "inner circle" connecting London's main-line stations. The Metropolitan and District railways completed the Circle line in 1884, built using the cut and cover method. Both railways expanded, the District building five branches to the west reaching Ealing, Uxbridge and Wimbledon and the Metropolitan extended as far as Verney Junction in Buckinghamshire, more than 50 miles from Baker Street and the centre of London.
For the first deep-level tube line, the City and South London Railway, two 10 feet 2 inches diameter circular tunnels were dug between King William Street and Stockwell, under the roads to avoid the need for agreement with owners of property on the surface. This opened in 1890 with electric locomotives that hauled carriages with small opaque windows, nicknamed padded cells; the Waterloo and City Railway opened in 1898, followed by the Central London Railway in 1900, known as the "twopenny tube". These two ran electric trains in circular tunnels having diameters between 11 feet 8 inches and 12 feet 2.5 inches, whereas the Great Northern and City Railway, which opened in 1904, was built to take main line trains from Finsbury Park to a Moorgate terminus in the City and had 16-foot diameter tunnels. While steam locomotives were in use on the Underground there were contrasting health reports. There were many instances of passengers collapsing whilst travelling, due to heat and pollution, leading for calls to clean the air through the installation of garden plants.
The Metropolitan encouraged beards for staff to act as an air filter. There were other reports claiming beneficial outcomes of using the Underground, including the designation of Great Portland Street as a "sanatorium for asthma and bronchial complaints", tonsillitis could be cured with acid gas and the Twopenny Tube cured anorexia. With the advent of electric Tube services, the Volks Electric Railway, in Brighton, competition from electric trams, the pioneering Underground companies needed modernising. In the early 20th century, the District and Metropolitan railways needed to electrify and a joint committee recommended an AC system, the two companies
Casement window
A casement is a window, attached to its frame by one or more hinges at the side. They are used singly or in pairs within a common frame, in which case they are hinged on the outside. Casement windows are held open using a casement stay. Windows hinged at the top are referred to as awning windows, ones hinged at the bottom are called hoppers. In the United Kingdom, casement windows were common before the sash window was introduced, metal with leaded glass—glass panes held in place with strips of lead; these casement windows were hinged on the side, opened inward. By the start of the Victorian era, opening casements and frames were constructed from timber in their entirety; the windows were covered by functional exterior shutters. Variants of casement windows are still the norm in many European countries, they are opened with a crank, lever, or cam handle, placed around hand height or at the bottom and serves as a window lock. A crank, stay, or friction hinge is necessary when the window opens outward, to hold the window in position despite wind.
The glass panes are set in a rabbeted frame and sealed with beveled putty or glazing compound to secure the glass. Casement windows are labelled in one of two ways. FCL refers to a left-handed window, where the hinges are located on the left and the locking mechanism is on the right. FCR is a right-handed window with the locking mechanism on the left. Remember, these definitions apply to a window. In some countries diagrams of casement windows show a dashed triangle with the hinged side identified by the point of the triangle, while in others they point to the lever, showing a simplified perspective of the opened window. Furthermore in some countries diagrams make distinction between windows opening towards the viewer or outwards. FCL windows feature a triangle pointing to the left. Casement windows "generally have lower air leakage rates than sliding windows because the sash closes by pressing against the frame." Casement windows are excellent for natural ventilation strategies in hot climates.
They can be hinged to open outward and angled in order to direct breezes into the building
Cottage garden
The cottage garden is a distinct style that uses informal design, traditional materials, dense plantings, a mixture of ornamental and edible plants. English in origin, it depends on charm rather than grandeur and formal structure. Homely and functional gardens connected to working-class cottages go back centuries, but their stylized reinvention occurred in 1870s England, as a reaction to the more structured, rigorously maintained estate gardens with their formal designs and mass plantings of greenhouse annuals; the earliest cottage gardens were more practical than today's, with emphasis on vegetables and herbs, fruit trees a beehive, livestock. Flowers, used to fill spaces became more dominant; the traditional cottage garden was enclosed with a rose-bowered gateway. Flowers common to early cottage gardens included traditional florists' flowers such as primroses and violets, along with flowers with household use such as calendula and various herbs. Others were the richly scented old-fashioned roses that bloomed once a year, simple flowers like daisies.
In time, cottage-garden sections were added to some large estate gardens as well. Modern cottage gardens include countless regional and personal variations and embrace plant materials, such as ornamental grasses or native plants not seen in the rural gardens of cottagers. Traditional roses, with their full fragrance and lush foliage, continue to be a cottage-garden mainstay—along with modern disease-resistant varieties that retain traditional attributes. Informal climbing plants, whether traditional or modern hybrids, are common, as are the self-sowing annuals and spreading perennials favoured in traditional cottagers' gardens. Cottage gardens, which emerged in Elizabethan times, appear to have originated as a local source for herbs and fruits. One theory is that they arose out of the Black Death of the 1340s, when the death of so many laborers made land available for small cottages with personal gardens. According to the late 19th-century legend of origin, these gardens were created by the workers that lived in the cottages of the villages, to provide them with food and herbs, with flowers planted in for decoration.
Helen Leach analysed the historical origins of the romanticised cottage garden, subjecting the garden style to rigorous historical analysis, along with the ornamental potager and the herb garden. She concluded that their origins were less in workingmen's gardens in the 19th century and more in the leisured classes' discovery of simple hardy plants, in part through the writings of John Claudius Loudon. Loudon helped to design the estate at Great Tew, where farm workers were provided with cottages that had architectural quality set in a smallholding or large garden—about an acre—where they could grow food and keep pigs and chickens. Authentic gardens of the yeoman cottager would have included a beehive and livestock, a pig and sty, along with a well; the peasant cottager of medieval times was more interested in meat than flowers, with herbs grown for medicinal use and cooking, rather than for their beauty. By Elizabethan times there was more prosperity, thus more room to grow flowers; the early cottage garden flowers had their practical use—violets were spread on the floor.
Others, such as sweet william and hollyhocks were grown for their beauty. The "naturalness" of informal design began to be noticed and developed by the British leisured class. Alexander Pope was an early proponent of less formal gardens, calling in a 1713 article for gardens with the "amiable simplicity of unadorned nature". Other writers in the 18th century who encouraged less formal, more natural, gardens included Joseph Addison and Lord Shaftesbury; the evolution of cottage gardens can be followed in the issues of The Cottage Gardener, edited by George William Johnson, where the emphasis is squarely on the "florist's flowers", carnations and auriculas in fancy varieties that were cultivated as a competitive blue-collar hobby. William Robinson and Gertrude Jekyll helped to popularise less formal gardens in their many books and magazine articles. Robinson's The Wild Garden, published in 1870, contained in the first edition an essay on "The Garden of British Wild Flowers", eliminated from editions.
In his The English Flower Garden, illustrated with cottage gardens from Somerset and Surrey, he remarked, "One lesson of these little gardens, that are so pretty, is that one can get good effects from simple materials." From the 1890s his lifelong friend Jekyll applied cottage garden principles to more structured designs in quite large country houses. Her Colour in the Flower Garden is still in print today. Robinson and Jekyll were part of the Arts and Crafts Movement, a broader movement in art and crafts during the late 19th century which advocated a return to the informal planting style derived as much from the Romantic tradition as from the actual English cottage garden; the Arts and Crafts Exhibition of 1888 began a movement toward an idealised natural country garden style. The garden designs of Robinson and Jekyll were associated with Arts and Crafts style houses. Both were influenced by William Morris, one of the leaders of the Arts and Crafts Movement—Robinson quoted Morris's views condemning carpet bedding.
When Morris built his Red House in Kent, it influenced new ideas in architecture and gardening—the "old-fashioned" garden became a fashion accessory among the British artistic middle class
General Permitted Development Order
The Town and Country Planning Order 2015 is a statutory instrument, applying in England, that grants planning permission for certain types of development. Schedule 2 of the GPDO 2015 specifies the classes of development for which planning permission is granted, specifies the exceptions and conditions that apply to some of these classes; the GPDO 2015 was made by the Secretary of State under authority granted by sections 59, 60, 333 of the Town and Country Planning Act 1990. The GPDO 2015 came into force on 15 April 2015, was introduced by Statutory Instrument 2015 No. 596. The GPDO 2015 revoked The Town and Country Planning Order 1995, the previous version of the legislation. Since it came into force, the GPDO 2015 has been amended by Statutory Instrument 2016 No. 332, by Statutory Instrument 2016 No. 1040, by Statutory Instrument 2017 No. 391, by Statutory Instrument 2017 No. 619. The website www.legislation.gov.uk, delivered by the National Archives, provides the original version of the GPDO 2015, but states that UK statutory instruments are not carried in their "revised" form on the website.
The previous version of the legislation, the GPDO 1995, came into force on 3 June 1995, was introduced by Statutory Instrument 1995 No. 418. During the time it was in force, the GPDO 1995 was amended by a number of subsequent statutory instruments. With respect to England, the Planning Jungle website states that the GPDO 1995 was amended by a total of 37 subsequent statutory instruments; the following list shows all of the versions of the GPDO from 1948 to present: The Town and Country Planning General Development Order 1948. The Town and Country Planning General Development Order 1959; the Town and Country Planning General Development Order 1963. The Town and Country Planning General Development Order 1973; the Town and Country Planning General Development Order 1977. The Town and Country Planning General Development Order 1988; the Town and Country Planning Order 1995. The Town and Country Planning Order 2015. Article 1 sets out that the GPDO 2015 applies to all land in England, with exceptions where the land is the subject of a special development order.
Article 2 defines various terms within the GPDO 2015. Article 3 sets out that the GPDO 2015 grants planning permission for the classes of development in Schedule 2, subject to any relevant exception, limitation or condition specified in Schedule 2. Article 3 sets out a number of exceptions, including that the GPDO 2015 does not permit development contrary to any condition imposed by any planning permission, that the GPDO 2015 does not grant permission where the existing building or use is unlawful. Article 4 sets out that the Secretary of State or the local planning authority may make a direction restricting certain permitted development rights. Schedule 3 sets out the procedure for introducing Article 4 directions. Schedule 1 Part 1 defines "article 2 land", which includes land, a national park, an Area of Outstanding Natural Beauty, a conservation area, The Broads, or a World Heritage Site. Schedule 1 Part 3 defines "article 2 land", which consists of designated areas within a total of 17 different local authorities.
Schedule 2 specifies the classes of development. These classes are contained within 19 "Parts". Schedule 2 specifies the classes of development for which planning permission is granted, specifies the exceptions and conditions that apply to some of these classes; these classes are contained within the following 19 "Parts": Part 1: Development within the curtilage of a dwellinghouse. Part 2: Minor operations. Part 3: Changes of use. Part 4: Temporary buildings and uses. Part 5: Caravan sites and recreational campsites. Part 6: Agricultural and forestry. Part 7: Non-domestic extensions, alterations etc. Part 8: Transport-related development. Part 9: Development relating to roads. Part 10: Repairs to services. Part 11: Heritage and demolition. Part 12: Development by local authorities. Part 13: Water and sewerage. Part 14: Renewable energy. Part 15: Power related development. Part 16: Communications. Part 17: Mining and mineral exploration. Part 18: Miscellaneous development. Part 19: Development by the Crown or for national security purposes.
The phrase "permitted development" is used to refer to Schedule 2 Part 1, which relates to "Development within the curtilage of a dwellinghouse". With respect to England, householder permitted development is set out by Schedule 2 Part 1 of the GPDO 2015, as introduced on 15 April 2015 by Statutory Instrument 2015 No. 596 amended on 6 April 2016 by Statutory Instrument 2016 No. 332, on 6 April 2017 by Statutory Instrument 2017 No. 391. In September 2008, the Department for Communities and Local Government published a document titled Guidance on the permeable surfacing of front gardens, which provides advice about how to interpret Part 1 Class F; this document was subsequently updated in May 2009. In August 2010, DCLG published a document titled Permitted development rights for householders: technical guidance, which provides advice about how to interpret Part 1; this document was subsequently updated in January 2013, October 2013, April 2014, April 2016. In May 2013, DCLG published a document titled Larger Home Extensions - Neighbour Consultation Scheme, which provides advice about the system of larger rear extensions und
Protected area
Protected areas or conservation areas are locations which receive protection because of their recognized natural, ecological or cultural values. There are several kinds of protected areas, which vary by level of protection depending on the enabling laws of each country or the regulations of the international organizations involved; the term "protected area" includes Marine Protected Areas, the boundaries of which will include some area of ocean, Transboundary Protected Areas that overlap multiple countries which remove the borders inside the area for conservation and economic purposes. There are over 161,000 protected areas in the world with more added daily, representing between 10 and 15 percent of the world's land surface area. By contrast, only 1.17% of the world's oceans is included in the world's ~6,800 Marine Protected Areas. Protected areas are essential for biodiversity conservation providing habitat and protection from hunting for threatened and endangered species. Protection helps maintain ecological processes that cannot survive in most intensely managed landscapes and seascapes.
Protected areas are understood to be those in which human occupation or at least the exploitation of resources is limited. The definition, accepted across regional and global frameworks has been provided by the International Union for Conservation of Nature in its categorisation guidelines for protected areas; the definition is as follows: A defined geographical space, recognized and managed, through legal or other effective means, to achieve the long-term conservation of nature with associated ecosystem services and cultural values. The objective of protected areas is to conserve biodiversity and to provide a way for measuring the progress of such conservation. Protected areas will encompass several other zones that have been deemed important for particular conservation uses, such as Important Bird Areas and Endemic Bird Areas, Centres of Plant Diversity and Community Conserved Areas, Alliance for Zero Extinction Sites and Key Biodiversity Areas among others. A protected area or an entire network of protected areas may lie within a larger geographic zone, recognised as a terrestrial or marine ecoregions, or a crisis ecoregions for example.
As a result, Protected Areas can encompass a broad range of governance types. Indeed, governance of protected areas has emerged a critical factor in their success. Subsequently, the range of natural resources that any one protected area may guard is vast. Many will be allocated for species conservation whether it be flora or fauna or the relationship between them, but protected areas are important for conserving sites of cultural importance and considerable reserves of natural resources such as. Of all global terrestrial carbon stock, 15.2% is contained within protected areas. Protected areas in South America hold 27% of the world's carbon stock, the highest percentage of any country in both absolute terms and as a proportion of the total stock. Rainforests: 18.8% of the world's forest is covered by protected areas and sixteen of the twenty forest types have 10% or more protected area coverage. Of the 670 ecoregions with forest cover, 54% have 10% or more of their forest cover protected under IUCN Categories I – VI.
Mountains: Nationally designated protected areas cover 14.3% of the world's mountain areas, these mountainous protected areas made up 32.5% of the world's total terrestrial protected area coverage in 2009. Mountain protected area coverage has increased globally by 21% since 1990 and out of the 198 countries with mountain areas, 43.9% still have less than 10% of their mountain areas protected. Annual updates on each of these analyses are made in order to make comparisons to the Millennium Development Goals and several other fields of analysis are expected to be introduced in the monitoring of protected areas management effectiveness, such as freshwater and marine or coastal studies which are underway, islands and drylands which are in planning. Through its World Commission on Protected Areas, the IUCN has developed six Protected Area Management Categories that define protected areas according to their management objectives, which are internationally recognised by various national governments and the United Nations.
The categories provide international standards for defining protected areas and encourage conservation planning according to their management aims. IUCN Protected Area Management Categories: Category Ia — Strict Nature Reserve Category Ib — Wilderness Area Category II — National Park Category III — Natural Monument or Feature Category IV — Habitat/Species Management Area Category V — Protected Landscape/Seascape Category VI – Protected Area with sustainable use of natural resources Protected areas are cultural artifacts, their story is entwined with that of human civilization. Protecting places and resources is by no means a modern concept, whether it be indigenous communities guarding sacred sites or the convention of European hunting reserves. Over 2000 years ago, royal decrees in India protected certain areas. In Europe and powerful people protected hunting grounds for a thousand years. Moreover, the idea of protection of special places is universal: for example, it occurs among the communities in the Pacific and in parts of Africa.
The oldest le
