Londinium

London is the capital of the United Kingdom and is the country's largest city with over seven million inhabitants.

London's population comprises an enormously diverse range of peoples, cultures and religions making it one of the most cosmopolitan cities in Europe, and the world. It is the home of very many institutions, organisations and companies, and as such remains at the heart of global affairs. It has a great number of important buildings including world famous museums, theatres, concert halls, airports, railway stations, palaces, and offices. It is the home of many embassies and consulates, and attracts a great many of the world's wealthiest people as permanent or temporary residents.

London produces 17% of the UK's GDP and is one of the world's major financial centres. A truly international city, London is pre-eminent in culture, communications, politics, finance, the arts and fashion. Along with New York City, Paris and Tokyo, London is among the four most important global cities.

Geography and Climate
Greater London covers an area of 609 square miles (1,579 square km). London is a port on the Thames, a navigable river. The river has therefore had a very important influence on the development of the city. London began on the Thames' north bank and for many centuries there was only a single bridge, London Bridge. Because of this the main focus of the city has been on the north side of the Thames. When more bridges were built in the 18th century, the city expanded in all directions as the mostly flat or gently rolling countryside presented no obstacle to growth. There are some hills in London, examples being Parliament Hill and Primrose Hill, but these provided fine prospects of the city centre without significantly affecting the directions of the spread of the city and London is therefore roughly circular.

The Thames was once a much broader shallower river than it is today. It has been extensively embanked, and many of its London tributaries now flow underground. The Thames is a tidal river, and London is vulnerable to flooding. The threat has increased over time due to a slow but continuous rise in high water level and the slow 'tilting' of Britain (up in the north and down in the south) caused by post-glacial rebound. The Thames Barrier was constructed across the Thames at Woolwichin the 1970s to deal with this threat, but in early 2005 it was suggested that a ten mile long barrier further downstream might be required to deal with the flood risk in the future.

London has a temperate climate, with warm but seldom hot summers, cool but rarely severe winters, and regular but generally light precipitation throughout the year. Summer temperatures rarely rise much above 33°C (91.4°F), though higher temperatures have become more common recently. The highest temperature ever recorded in London was 37.9°C (100.2°F), measured at Heathrow Airport during the European Heat Wave of 2003. Heavy snowfalls are almost unknown. In recent winters, snow has generally only settled once or twice and it is rarely more than an inch (25 mm) or so. London's average annual precipitation of less than 600 mm (24 inches) is lower than that of Rome or Sydney. London's large built up area creates a micro climate, with heat stored by the city's buildings. Sometimes temperatures are 5°C (9°F) warmer in the city than in the surrounding areas.
History
Named by the Romans as Londinium, it was the capital of the Roman province of Britannia. The "City", where Londinium was originally sited is now just one small part of modern central London and is the financial and banking centre of the city, known colloquially as the "Square Mile". The heart of modern London now includes the West End, located in the City of Westminster. Once a separate settlement to the west of the City of London, Westminster has been the base of the English royal court and government since the mediæval era. From the 16th to the early 20th centuries London flourished as the capital of the British Empire.

Londinium was founded on the north bank of the River Thames circa AD 50. Although there is no evidence of a large pre-Roman settlement, the name is thought to be pre-Roman. It is believed to have become the capital of the Roman province of Britannia in the early second century. After the fall of the Roman Empire, the Roman city was virtually abandoned and a Saxon town named Lundenwic was established a mile or so to the West in what is now the Aldwych area in the 7th century AD. The fortified Roman City of London was re-occupied during the late 9th or early 10th century, whereafter it resumed its role as England's largest - though not capital - city (Winchester was the capital city of England until the 12th century). In 1666, the Great Fire of London swept through and destroyed a large part of the City of London. Re-building took over 10 years, but London's growth accelerated in the 18th century and by the early 19th century it was the largest city in the world. During World War II, the city suffered severe damage in The Blitz which killed over 30,000 Londoners.

London has grown steadily over centuries since Roman times absorbing villages and towns, farmland, countryside, meadows and woodlands, spreading outwards in every direction. Attempts to control this growth have been made in recent decades, for example through the creation of the Green Belt. In recent years major developments have been concentrated in the London Docklands and Thames Gateway areas of East London.
Modern London
Today Greater London comprises the small central City of London, 32 London boroughs including the City of Westminster, and the Inner and Middle Temples. The dominant centre of activity in London is the City of Westminster (including the West End) which is is the main cultural, entertainment and shopping district, the location of most of London's major corporate headquarters outside of the financial services sector, and the centre of the UK's national government. The City of London, (known as the "square mile"), is an important financial centre. Very busy during the working week, most parts of the City tend to be quiet at weekends, since it is primarily a non-residential area.

London attracts very large numbers of visitors and tourists. Tourist attractions are mainly in Central London, comprising the historic City of London; the West End with its cinemas, bars, clubs, theatres, shops and restaurants; the City of Westminster with the Royal palaces of Buckingham Palace, Clarence House etc., the Royal Borough of Kensington and Chelsea with its museums (the Science Museum, Natural History Museum, and Victoria and Albert Museum) and Hyde Park. Other important tourist attractions include the Bankside area of Southwark with the Globe Theatre, Tate Modern, and London Bridge, Tower Bridge and the Tower of London, Tate Britain on the Embankment, the British Museum in Bloomsbury. There are many other museums and places of interest.
Demographics
London was the most populous city in the world from 1825 until 1925, when it was overtaken by New York City.

Residents of London are known as 'Londoners'. In the 2001 census the City and the 32 boroughs (some 1579 km² or 610 square miles) had an official 7,172,036 inhabitants, making London one of the most populous cities in Europe alongside Moscow, and Paris. Subsequent reviews suggested that the returns were understated, and that the population on Census Day was closer to 7.29 million.

In the 2001 official census 76% of these seven million people classed their ethnic group as white (classified as British White, Irish or "Other White" in the Census of 2001), 10% as Indian, Bangladeshi or Pakistani, 5% as black African, 5% as black Caribbean, 3% as mixed race and 1% as Chinese. The largest religious groupings are Christian (58.2%) and No Religion (15.8%). 21.8% of inhabitants were born outside the European Union. The Irish are the largest foreign-born group in London (numbering approximately 200,000).

Unlike many other countries, the UK does not provide national metropolitan area population figures based on commuter percentages and economic influence. This is left up to each individual city to define. This has created much confusion when comparing London's true metropolitan area region with others around the world. It is helped even less by the term "Greater London" for the political entity of the "City Proper", which is often confused as a metropolitan area.

Without a specific National reference to London's metropolitan area, many different sources provide alternate definitions. One such definition decribes the London metropolitan area (6,267 square miles, 16,043 km²) with a population of 13,945,000 — larger than the combined populations of Scotland, Wales and Northern Ireland. It is the largest metropolitan area in Europe, and one of the World's largest 20.

However, in 2004, the Government of Greater London has officially defined their metropolitan area with a population of approximately 18 million people, including a large portion (though not all of) the South East England and East of England regions (As described in the "London Plan" from the Mayor of London external link below). This area is similar in size to many large North American metropolitan areas. It should be noted however that this designation bears little or no relation to what "London" is understood to be by the British public.



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