london's parks and gardens

8/6/2019 London's Parks and Gardens

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Londons Parks and Gardens

The are many parks and open spaces in London. Green space in central London consists of five Royal

Parks, supplemented by a number of small garden squares scattered throughout the city centre.

Open space in the rest of the city is dominated by the remaining three Royal Parks and many other

parks and open spaces of a range of sizes, run mainly by the local London boroughs, although other

owners include the National Trust and the City of London Corporation.

Royal Parks of London

The Royal Parks of London are lands originally owned by the monarchy of England or the United

Kingdom for the recreation (mostly hunting) of the royal family. They are part of the hereditary

possessions of the Crown. They are the most beautiful parks in London. The public does not have any

legal right to use the Parks, as public access depends on the grace and favour of the Crown, although

there may be public rights of way across the land. The Royal Parks Agency (an executive agency of

the Department for Culture, Media and Sport, the Chief Executive of the agency is Mark Camley,

appointed in 2005) manages the Royal Parks under powers derived from the law Act from 1851. As

part of its statutory management function the Agency permits the public to use the Parks for

recreational purposes. The current regulations are the Royal Parks and Other Open SpacesRegulations 1997.

With increasing urbanisation of London, some of these were preserved as freely accessible open

space and became public parks. There are today eight parks formally described by this name and

they cover almost 2,000 hectares of land in Greater London:

* Bushy Park, 445 hectares

* The Green Park, 19 hectares

* Greenwich Park, 74 hectares

* Hyde Park, 142 hectares

* Kensington Gardens, 111 hectares

* The Regent's Park, 166 hectares

* Richmond Park, 955 hectares

* St. James's Park, 23 hectares

There is also Brompton Cemetery which, although not a park, is another of the green spaces

managed by Royal Parks. The parks are policed by the Royal Parks Operational Command Unit of the

Metropolitan Police. The main form of funding for the Royal Parks is a central government grant. This

contrasts with most of London's other parks, which are funded by local borough councils. The Royal

Parks Foundation is a registered charity which raises funds to protect, support and create new

opportunities within the Parks. The Royal Parks generate additional income from commercial

activities such as catering and staging public events such as concerts, which are presented in details

on their website: http://www.royalparks.gov.uk/

Richmond Park is a 955 hectares park within London. Almost three times as large as New York City's

Central Park, it is the largest of the Royal Parks in London and Britain's second largest urban walled

park after Sutton Park, Birmingham. The park is famous for its red and fallow deer, which number

over six hundred. The highest point within the park is King Henry VIII's Mound. There is a protected

view of St Paul's Cathedral from the Mound, and a view of central London's London Eye, Natwest

Tower and 'The Gherkin', appearing to be close to each other. Richmond Park is a Site of Special

Scientific Interest, a National Nature Reserve and a Special Area of Conservation for the Stag beetle.

Bushy Park is the second largest of London's Royal Parks, at 445 hectares in area. The Park has long

been popular with locals, but also attracts those from further afield. From the mid-Nineteenth

Century until World War II Londoners came here to celebrate Chestnut Sunday and to see the

abundant blooming of the trees along Chestnut Avenue; the tradition resumed in 1993.During World


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War II, General Dwight D. Eisenhower planned the D-Day landings from Supreme Headquarters Allied

Expeditionary Force (SHAEF) at Camp Griffiss in the Park. A memorial by Carlos Rey dedicated to the

Allied troops who fell on D-Day now marks the spot where General Eisenhower's tent stood.

Regent's Park (officially The Regent's Park) is in the north-western part of central London partly in

the City of Westminster and partly in the London Borough of Camden. It contains Regent's College

and the London Zoo. The park has an outer ring road called the Outer Circle (4.3 km) and an innerring road called the Inner Circle, which surrounds the most carefully tended section of the park,

Queen Mary's Gardens, in which the Open Air Theatre is located. The northern side of the park is the

home of London Zoo and the headquarters of the Zoological Society of London.The Camden Green

Fair and Bikefest is held in Regents Park on the first Sunday in June from noon to 7pm. It is held as

part of an ongoing effort to encourage citizens of London to go Green. In The Hundred and One

Dalmatians, a popular children's novel, the protagonist dalmatian dogs live near Regent's Park (and

are taken there for walks). Ian Fleming's James Bond novels frequently mention the headquarters of

MI6 as a "tall, grey building near Regent's Park.

Hyde Park is famous for its original and the most noted Speakers Corner of the world, in the north-

east corner of Park. Speakers there may speak on any subject, as long as the police consider their

speeches lawful, although this right is not restricted to Speakers' Corner only the same right to freespeech applies everywhere else in the UK. Contrary to popular belief, there is no immunity from the

law, nor are any subjects proscribed, but in practice the police tend to be tolerant and therefore only

intervene when they receive a complaint or if they hear profanity. The park is divided in two by the

Serpentine, also known as the Serpentine River, which is a 28-acre recreational lake, created in 1730.

The park is a traditional location for mass demonstrations. The Chartists, the Reform League, the

Suffragettes and the Stop The War Coalition have all held protests in the park. The park was also the

site of The Great Exhibition of 1851, for which the Crystal Palace was designed by Joseph Paxton.

Kensington Gardens, once the private gardens of Kensington Palace lies immediately to the west of

Hyde Park. The border between the two is a bridge on the aforementioned Serpentine. The open

spaces of Kensington Gardens, Hyde Park, Green Park and St. James's Park together form an almost

continuous "green lung" in the heart of London between Kensington and Westminster.Kensington

Gardens was carved out of the western section of Hyde Park and designed with fashionable features

including the Round Pond, formal avenues and a Dutch garden. The Dutch garden is a kind of garden

distinguished by its dense atmosphere and efficient use of space. This space would be laid out in a

highly cultivated and geometrical, often symmetrical, fashion, shaped by dense plantings of highly

coloured flowers, and sometimes edged with areas of artificial water. The park is the setting of J.M.

Barrie's book Peter Pan in Kensington Gardens, a prelude to the character's famous adventures in

Neverland. Both the book and the character are honoured with the Peter Pan statue located in the

park.

Greenwich Park is a former hunting park in Greenwich and it was the first to be enclosed in Royal

Parks in 1433. On a hill in Greenwich Park, overlooking the River Thames is the Royal Observatory

(formerly the Royal Greenwich Observatory or RGO), which played a major role in the history of

astronomy and navigation, and is best known as the location of the primemeridian. On the upper

level of the park, there is an extensive flower garden complete with large duck pond, a rose garden, a

cricket pitch, many 17th century chestnut trees, an ancient oak tree (the 'Queens Oak', associated

with Queen Elizabeth I) and an enclosure ('The Wilderness') housing some wild deer.

St. James's Park is a park in Westminster, central London, the oldest of the Royal Parks of London.

The park lies at the southernmost tip of the St. James's area, which was named after a leper hospital

dedicated to St. James the Less. The park has a small lake, St. James's Park Lake, with two islands,

Duck Island (named for the lake's collection ofwaterfowl), and West Island.


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Green Park (officially The Green Park) lies between London's Hyde Park and St. James's Park. By

contrast with its neighbours, Green Park has no lakes, no buildings and few monuments, having only

the Canada Memorial by Pierre Granche and the Constance Fund Fountain. The park consists entirely

of wooded meadows. At the time, the park was on the outskirts of London and remained an isolated

area well into the 18th century, when it was known as a haunt ofhighwaymen and thieves. It was a

popular place for ballooning attempts and public firework displays during the 18th and 19th

centuries. The park was also known as a duelling ground.

The Rest

Many of the smaller green spaces in central London are garden squares. Squares in London have long

been a feature of London. A few, such as Trafalgar Square, were built as public open spaces, like the

city squares found in many cities, but most of them originally contained private communal gardens,

sometimes known as garden squares, for use by the inhabitants of the surrounding houses. This type

of space is most prevalent in central London, but squares are also found in the suburbs. Some of

these gardens are now open to the public, while others are still private. Notable examples open to

the public are Russell Square in Bloomsbury, Lincoln's Inn Fields in Holborn (the largest public square

in London) and Soho Square in Soho. The Royal Borough of Kensington and Chelsea contains over a

hundred garden squares whose use is restricted to residents. The upkeep of these squares is paid forthrough a levy on top of residents' council tax.

In addition to these spaces, a large number of council-owned parks were developed between the mid

19th century and the Second World War, including Victoria Park (86 ha), Alexandra Park (80 ha) and

Battersea Park (83 ha). The biggest one of them, Victoria Park, will play a major role in the London

2012 Olympics as a Live Site with free access big screens and used for other Olympic events.


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SOWNICTWO:

London borough part of a city that has its own local government. The administrative area of

Greater London contains thirty-two London boroughs. Inner London comprises twelve of these

boroughs plus the City of London. Outer London comprises the twenty remaining boroughs of

Greater London. The London boroughs are administered by London Borough Councils which are

elected every four years. The boroughs are the principal local authorities in London and areresponsible for running most local services in their areas, such as schools, social services, waste

collection and roads. There are three boroughs which do not use the term "London Borough of" in

their names. They are Westminster, which is termed the City of Westminster as it has city status; and

Kingston upon Thames and Kensington and Chelsea, which are termed "Royal Borough of", due to

their Royal borough status.

hereditary of illnesses: given to a child by its parents before it is born; of possessions: that is legally

given t somebodys child, when that person dies

grant (noun) a sum of money that is given by the government or by another organization to be

used for a particular purpose (donation)

mound a large pile of earth or stones, a small hill

fair a type of entertainment in a field or park at which people can ride on large machines and play

games to win prizes

go green/to green to become more environmentally friendly, more eco-friendly; To become

environmentally aware.

profanity swear words, or religious words used in a way that shows a lack of respect for God or

holy things

meridian one of the lines that is drawn from the north Pole to the South Pole on a map of theworld

enclosure a piece of land that is surrounded by a fence or wall and is used for a particular purpose

leprosy - a bacterial, chronic disease of skin, left untreated, leprosy can be progressive, causing

permanent damage to the skin, nerves, limbs and eyes (trd)

waterfowl a bird that can swim and lives near water, especially a duck or goose

meadow a field covered in grass

highwayman a man, usually on a horse and carrying a gun, who stole from travellers on public

roads in the past

duel a formal fight with weapons between two people, used in the past to settle disagreement,

especially over a matter of honour

levy an extra amount of money that has to be paid, especially as a tax to the government

council tax - the system of local taxation used in England, Scotland and Wales to part fund the

services provided by local government in each country


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London bo

ou

hs

1 City of London (not a London borough)

2 City of Westminster

3 Kensington and Che sea

4 Hammersmith and Fulham

5 Wands

orth

6 Lambeth

7 Southwark

8 Tower Hamlets

9 Hackney

10 Islington

11

Camden12 Brent

13 Ealing

14 Hounslow

15 Richmond upon Thames

16 Kingston upon Thames

17 Merton

18 Sutton

19 Croydon

20 Bromley

21 Lewisham

22 Greenwich

23 Be

ley

24 Havering

25 Barking and Dagenham

26 Redbridge

27

Newham28 Waltham Forest

29 Haringey

30 Enfield

31 Barnet

32 Harrow

33 Hillingdon


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St Paul's from King Henry's Mound

Chestnut trees of Bushy Park in early Autumn


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The Triton Fountain in Queen Mary's Gardens

The Crystal Palace (1854)


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The Dutch Garden in Kensington Gardens

Royal Observatory, Greenwich


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View of Buckingham Palace from St. James's Park

Canada Gate, located on the south side of the Green Park


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Lincolns Inn Field

london's parks and gardens

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