Somers Town, London
From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
| Somers Town | |
  Somers Town shown within Greater London |
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| OS grid reference | |
|---|---|
| London borough | Camden |
| Ceremonial county | Greater London |
| Region | London |
| Constituent country | England |
| Sovereign state | United Kingdom |
| Post town | LONDON |
| Postcode district | NW1 |
| Dialling code | 020 |
| Police | Metropolitan |
| Fire | London |
| Ambulance | London |
| European Parliament | London |
| UK Parliament | Holborn and St. Pancras |
| London Assembly | Barnet and Camden |
| List of places: UK • England • London | |
Somers Town, named after the Somers family who owned the land, is an area of London south of Camden Town. Historically, the locality known as Somers Town was the whole of the triangular space between the Hampstead, Pancras, and Euston Roads. Modern Somers Town is generally regarded as being the area bounded by Euston Road, Eversholt Street, Crowndale Road, Pancras Road and the railway approaches to St Pancras Station. Vehicular through traffic is not heavy and confined by traffic calming and other measures to a few North/South arterial throughways.
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[edit] History
The area has been shaped by three mainline railways termini: Euston (1838), St. Pancras (1868) and Kings Cross (1852), and the Somers Town railways and canals goods depot (1887) (now the site of the British Library).
Somers Town ward used to include a number of hospitals including Elizabeth Garret Anderson, National Temperance and St. Pancras Hospital(formerly the St Pancras Workhouse). They have all closed since 1980. The large forbidding red brick building complex to the North of St Pancras Gardens which was St Pancras Hospital, more recently housed non resident UCL Hospital nurses, and is now the HQ of Camden Primary Care NHS Trust. It also accommodates parts of Islington Primary care Trust, St Pancras Coroners Court and a small 'day hospital'. St Pancras Old Church is adjacent to 'the workhouse' and is one of the oldest churches in London. Within the churchyard are many memorials to Victorian dignitaries.
In 1784 the first housing was built at the "Polygon", now the site of a council block of flats called "Oakshot Court". The development was not entirely successful and the land was subsequently sold off in smaller lots that attracted people escaping from the French revolution until overcrowding became manifest. Mary Wollstonecraft lived on this site.
Improving the slum housing conditions was first undertaken by St. Pancras Council from 1906, by St Pancras Housing Association formed by a Church of England priest, Father Basil Jellicoe from 1924 and by the London County Council from 1927. There remains a small enclave of Grade 2 listed houses.
Sir William Collins school, established in the 1890's and later renamed South Camden Community School, is the main statesecondary school in the area. Somers Town has a large sports centre, built on the school playground, owned by the University College London Union, based just south of Euston Road. It is used by their sports teams for training and home matches but in the future it will be owned by south camden community school as part of BSF plan.
In addition to the large secondary school, there are three primary schools, Edith Neville (state), St. Aloysious (state-aided Catholic) and St Mary and St Pancras (state-aided Church of England). The latter has been rebuilt, beneath four floors of University College London (UCL) accommodation units. UCL is based a few hundred yards to the south of Euston Road and is a major employer of local residents.
In the 1980s some council tenants took advantage of the 'right to buy' scheme, and, bought their homes with a substantial discount, later moving away from the area into the outer suburbs of North London. This led to an influx of young semi-professionals, resulting in a changing population and a more diverse place to live.
[edit] Today
Major construction work along the Eastern boundary of Somers Town ward is nearly concluded at the time of writing in 2008, as redevelopment of the King's Cross area and the St. Pancras Channel Tunnel rail terminal. Eurostar recently become operational from the new complex.
Somers Town Market is a flourishing open street market, held in Chalton Street, adjacent to the British Library, every Friday.
There is a Somers Town Festival held every year in July on the site of the Chalton Street market that purports to "showcase" the "cultural diversity" of the area and actually helps reflect an absence of shared culture and values expensively cultivated for political purposes by a socially pernicious tax-financed and town hall backed oxymoronic concept of 'multicultural society'.
A piece of empty space left over after the British Library and Chunnel terminal developments is to become a vital missing high tech biological sciences component, that together with units in adjacent areas, will make Somers Town a focus of a 21st century world ranking biotech industry. The project is deeply contentious and has been contesed by both local councilors and a group of Somers Town residents.
[edit] Notable residents
- Joe Cole, England footballer, hails from Somers Town
- Jimmy McDonald, boxer, also lived in Somers Town
- Fred Titmus was born in Somers Town
- Mary Wollstonecraft Godwin (Mary Shelley), most famous for her novel Frankenstein, was born at 29 Polygon Square, Somers Town, in 1797.
- Guy-Toussaint-Julien Carron, French priest who fled the French Revolution and established the chapel of St. Aloysius and other institutions in the area.
- John Addison, Cambridge professor of music, lived in Camden Cottages until his death in 1844.
- Arthur Rimbaud
- Antonio Puigblanch (1775-1840). Author of The Inquisition Unmasked, London, 1816.
[edit] Transport and locale
[edit] Nearby areas
- Camden Town to the north
- Euston to the west
- Kings Cross to the east
- St Pancras to the south-east
- Bloomsbury to the south
[edit] Nearest Tube stations
[edit] Nearest Railway stations
[edit] See also
[edit] Notes
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[edit] External links
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