The County of London Plan was an urban planning proposal prepared for the London County Council in 1943 by John Henry Forshaw (1895–1973) and Sir Leslie Patrick Abercrombie (1879–1957), with foreword from Charles Latham, leader of the council. Its main purpose was to point out the main directions of development and reconstruction of London, which in the past decades had faced large changes and irregular growth. It was prepared in anticipation of the end of World War II and the reconstruction after bomb damage and large movements of population.
It focused on five problems, for which it proposed solutions:
- traffic congestion
- depressed housing
- inadequacy and maldistribution of open spaces
- jumble of houses and industries
- sprawl, and suburbanisation of surrounding country towns
Ring roads
One of the solutions was to create ring roads around the capital. Construction would have involved considerable disruption, even through parts of the city damaged by bombs, and the roads were not built, but the "C Ring" (the third ring out from the city centre) was to include what is now the South Circular Road. The plan to build a high-quality road was not realised, but the semi-circular route was assigned to existing roads through the southern suburbs. A similar plan was reintroduced in the 1960s under the name of the London Ringways.
Predecessors
In 1905, the Royal Commission on London Traffic issued a report recommending improvements to road, tram and rail services including a "circular road about 75 miles in length at a radius of 12 miles from St Paul's".
In 1937, the Ministry of Transport published The Highway Development Survey by Sir Edwin Lutyens and Sir Charles Bressey, which reviewed London's road needs and recommended the construction of many miles of new roads and the improvement of junctions at key congestion areas. Among the proposals was a series of orbital roads around the city with the outer ones built as American-style parkways, which are wide, landscaped roads with limited access and grade-separated junctions.
Railway services
thumb|Map showing the County of London Plan's four deep level underground rail routes
The report recommended electrification of all rail routes and removal of elevated viaducts, with the elimination of railway bridges crossing the Thames being a key priority.
See also
- Greater London Plan
- Park system
- Landscape planning
- North Circular Road- the north London counterpart of the South Circular Road
- M25 London Orbital Motorway- the outermost London ring, completed in 1986