ABSTRACT
The metropolitan area of the 1950s is still in the back of many people's minds as the natural condition of cities. It is hard to accept that it belongs to an ever more distant historical period. London, protected by England's island location, began to grow outside its walls long before the cities of continental Europe. The creation of a preferred urban residential district, its invasion by commerce, and the establishment of new preferred neighborhoods farther west of the original center is a repeating pattern in the growth of London. Because so much of the industrial revolution began in England, London is really the first modern metropolis, and its growth patterns prefigure the development of all modern metropolitan areas. Escape to more rural suburbs also began early in London. The pattern of city development that persisted throughout the 1950s has now given way to the modern, fractured metropolis.
