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Metropolitan Board Of Works
The Metropolitan Board of Works (MBW) was the principal instrument of local government in a wide area of Middlesex, Surrey, and Kent, defined by the Metropolis Management Act 1855, from December 1855 until the establishment of the London County Council in March 1889. Its principal responsibility was to provide infrastructure to cope with the rapid growth of the metropolis, which it accomplished with varying degrees of success. The MBW was an appointed rather than elected body. This lack of accountability made it unpopular with Londoners, especially in its latter years, when it fell prey to corruption. Background The growth of an urban area around the historic City of London had rapidly accelerated with the increase in railway commuting from the 1830s onwards. However, its local government was chaotic, with hundreds of authorities having varying fields of responsibility and overlapping geographic boundaries. Providing a specific service in a given area might need the co-ordinatio ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Unicameral
Unicameralism (from ''uni''- "one" + Latin ''camera'' "chamber") is a type of legislature, which consists of one house or assembly, that legislates and votes as one. Unicameral legislatures exist when there is no widely perceived need for multicameralism (two or more chambers). Many multicameral legislatures were created to give separate voices to different sectors of society. Multiple houses allowed, for example, for a guaranteed representation of different social classes (as in the Parliament of the United Kingdom or the French States-General). Sometimes, as in New Zealand and Denmark, unicameralism comes about through the abolition of one of two bicameral chambers, or, as in Sweden, through the merger of the two chambers into a single one, while in others a second chamber has never existed from the beginning. Rationale for unicameralism and criticism The principal advantage of a unicameral system is more efficient lawmaking, as the legislative process is simpler and there is ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
River Lea
The River Lea ( ) is in South East England. It originates in Bedfordshire, in the Chiltern Hills, and flows southeast through Hertfordshire, along the Essex border and into Greater London, to meet the River Thames at Bow Creek. It is one of the largest rivers in London and the easternmost major tributary of the Thames. The river's significance as a major east–west barrier and boundary has tended to obscure its importance as north–south trade route. Below Hertford the river has since medieval times had alterations made to make it more navigable for boats between the Thames and eastern Hertfordshire and Essex, known as the Lee Navigation. This stimulated much industry along its banks. The navigable River Stort, the main tributary, joins it at Hoddesdon. While the lower Lea remains somewhat polluted, its upper stretch and tributaries, classified as chalk streams, are a major source of drinking water for London. An artificial waterway known as the New River, opened in 1613, ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
London Sewerage System
The London sewer system is part of the water infrastructure serving London, England. The modern system was developed during the late 19th century, and as London has grown the system has been expanded. It is currently owned and operated by Thames Water and serves almost all of Greater London. History During the early 19th century the River Thames was an open sewer, with disastrous consequences for public health in London, including cholera epidemics. These were caused by enterotoxin-producing strains of the bacterium ''Vibrio cholerae''. Although the contamination of the water supply was correctly diagnosed by Dr John Snow in 1849 as the method of communication, up to the outbreak of 1866 it was believed that miasma, or bad air, was responsible. Proposals to modernise the sewerage system had been made in the early 1700s but the costs of such a project deterred progress. Further proposals followed in 1856, but were again neglected due to the costs. However, after the Great Stink ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
The Great Stink
The Great Stink was an event in Central London during July and August 1858 in which the hot weather exacerbated the smell of untreated human waste and industrial effluent that was present on the banks of the River Thames. The problem had been mounting for some years, with an ageing and inadequate sewer system that emptied directly into the Thames. The miasma from the effluent was thought to transmit contagious diseases, and three outbreaks of cholera before the Great Stink were blamed on the ongoing problems with the river. The smell, and fears of its possible effects, prompted action from the national and local administrators who had been considering possible solutions for the problem. The authorities accepted a proposal from the civil engineer Joseph Bazalgette to move the effluent eastwards along a series of interconnecting sewers that sloped towards outfalls beyond the metropolitan area. Work on high-, mid- and low-level systems for the new Northern and Southern Outfa ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Thames
The River Thames ( ), known alternatively in parts as the River Isis, is a river that flows through southern England including London. At , it is the longest river entirely in England and the second-longest in the United Kingdom, after the River Severn. The river rises at Thames Head in Gloucestershire, and flows into the North Sea near Tilbury, Essex and Gravesend, Kent, via the Thames Estuary. From the west it flows through Oxford (where it is sometimes called the Isis), Reading, Henley-on-Thames and Windsor. The Thames also drains the whole of Greater London. In August 2022, the source of the river moved five miles to beyond Somerford Keynes due to the heatwave in July 2022. The lower reaches of the river are called the Tideway, derived from its long tidal reach up to Teddington Lock. Its tidal section includes most of its London stretch and has a rise and fall of . From Oxford to the Estuary the Thames drops by 55 metres. Running through some of the drier parts of mai ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Vestry
A vestry was a committee for the local secular and ecclesiastical government for a parish in England, Wales and some English colonies which originally met in the vestry or sacristy of the parish church, and consequently became known colloquially as the "vestry". Overview For many centuries, in the absence of any other authority (which there would be in an incorporated city or town), the vestries were the sole ''de facto'' local government in most of the country, and presided over local, communal fundraising and expenditure until the mid or late 19th century using local established Church chairmanship. They were concerned for the spiritual but also the temporal as well as physical welfare of parishioners and its parish amenities, collecting local rates or taxes and taking responsibility for numerous functions such as the care of the poor, the maintaining of roads, and law enforcement, etc. More punitive matters were dealt with by the manorial court and hundred court, and latter ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Parliament Of The United Kingdom
The Parliament of the United Kingdom is the supreme legislative body of the United Kingdom, the Crown Dependencies and the British Overseas Territories. It meets at the Palace of Westminster, London. It alone possesses legislative supremacy and thereby ultimate power over all other political bodies in the UK and the overseas territories. Parliament is bicameral but has three parts, consisting of the sovereign ( King-in-Parliament), the House of Lords, and the House of Commons (the primary chamber). In theory, power is officially vested in the King-in-Parliament. However, the Crown normally acts on the advice of the prime minister, and the powers of the House of Lords are limited to only delaying legislation; thus power is ''de facto'' vested in the House of Commons. The House of Commons is an elected chamber with elections to 650 single-member constituencies held at least every five years under the first-past-the-post system. By constitutional convention, all governme ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Metropolitan Interments Act 1852
Metropolitan may refer to: * Metropolitan area, a region consisting of a densely populated urban core and its less-populated surrounding territories * Metropolitan borough, a form of local government district in England * Metropolitan county, a type of county-level administrative division of England Businesses * Metro-Cammell, previously the Metropolitan Cammell Carriage and Wagon Company * Metropolitan-Vickers, a British heavy electrical engineering company * Metropolitan Stores, a Canadian former department store chain * Metropolitan Books, an imprint of Henry Holt and Company Colleges and universities * Leeds Metropolitan University, United Kingdom * London Metropolitan University, United Kingdom * Manchester Metropolitan University, United Kingdom * Metropolitan Community College (Omaha), United States * Metropolitan State University of Denver, United States ** Metro State Roadrunners * Metropolitan State University, in Saint Paul, Minnesota * Oslo Metropolitan University, ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Coal Tax
Coal-tax posts are boundary marker posts found in southern England. They were erected in the 1860s and form an irregular loop between 12 and 18 miles from London to mark the points where taxes on coal were due to the Corporation of London. There were originally around 280 posts of which around 210 remain. History Coal imported into the City of London had been taxed since medieval times and, as it was originally all brought by sea to riverside wharfs, the collection of the duties was relatively easy. The City is a small (one square mile) but influential and rich part of London. The Port of London, within which the duties were payable, stretched far beyond the boundaries of the City, all the way along the Thames from Yantlet Creek (downstream from Gravesend) to Staines. By the 19th century, however, there was increasing trade by canal and rail, and various Acts of Parliament extended the catchment area to include these new modes of transport. In 1845 the boundary was set at a rad ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Metropolitan Police District
The Metropolitan Police District (MPD) is the police area which is policed by the Metropolitan Police Service in London. It currently consists of the Greater London region, excluding the City of London. The Metropolitan Police District was created by the Metropolitan Police Act 1829 as an ad hoc area of administration because the built-up area of London spread at the time into many parishes and counties without an established boundary. The district expanded as the built up area grew and stretched some distance into rural land. When county police forces were set up in England, those of Essex, Hertfordshire, Kent and Surrey did not cover the parts of the counties within the MPD, while Middlesex did not have a county force. Similarly, boroughs in the MPD that elsewhere would have been entitled to their own police force did not have them. The MPD was originally defined in reference to civil parishes and in 1946 was altered to correspond to local government districts. The MPD has been ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
