ABSTRACT
Between 1880 and 1911 London's population grew from approxi mately four and a half million to over seven million. Not all areas shared in this enormous growth, for while the outer London districts experienced great increases, the central districts lost population in every decade from 1871 onwards. Over the first two decades of the new century the county of London as a whole had a declining popula tion and the central area lost over 136,000 people (a decrease of almost nine per cent over the two decades); the outer London districts on the other hand grew by over 684,000 people (an increase of over thirtynine per cent). In the i88os the four places in England and Wales with the most rapidly growing populations were all predominantly working-class London suburbs-Willesden, Leyton, Tottenham, and West Ham-and another four suburbs, all with heavy concentrations of workmen within their borders, were at the top of the list of fastest developing communities in England and Wales. The expansion of these working-class suburbs was the product of natural growth, im migration to London, and emigration from the inner districts. I t is only with the last of these three factors that we are concerned in this chapter, and while there are many aspects of suburban development that were controversial then and have continued to provoke argument among historians (especially the role of the speculative builders, the aesthetic standards and quality of the houses they erected, and the quality of life in the suburbs generally), this chapter concentrates on the effect of the working-class suburbs on the housing crisis in central London. ^
The Eternal Slum
From the mid-nineteenth century the suburbs had been hailed as a possible panacea for the housing question. They would, it was hoped, house vast numbers of working men in green and pleasant surround ings and provide a lasting ( i f essentially fugitive) solution to the problem of the slum. The folly and futility of trying to compete with industry and commerce in the centre when there were far cheaper building sites just beyond the built-up area, occurred to many, and from the 1850s the idea of developing 'industrial villages' or workingclass colonies on the outskirts of London was very much in the air. In the 1850s it was still possible in Hornsey or Tottenham to find land for only £ 1 0 0 or £200 an acre compared with £10,000 or even £15 ,000 in inner London.^ But it was not a simple operation to take advantage of these discrepancies in costs to house the working classes in the suburbs at a fraction of the cost of doing so in the centre. There were many problems, psychological and sociological, as well as economic, involved, but above all there was the problem of transporta tion-how to make the suburbs accessible to those who worked in the central area. Without cheap, rapid, and conveniently scheduled transit the suburb could not offer a way out for the slum dweller.
