Arthur Figgis wrote:
John B wrote:
On Jul 18, 3:05 pm, "Basil Jet"
wrote:
John B wrote:

(for m.t.u-t'ers, Middlesex hasn't existed for 44 years)
Middlesex exists, it just isn't recognised by the national government.

http://maps.google.co.uk/maps?hl=en&...7,-0.148702&sp...

http://maps.google.co.uk/maps?hl=en&...5,-0.138509&sp...

I understand that these signs were put up by Enfield Council less
than 15
years ago. I'm not aware of any others.

Seems unlikely: councils aren't normally allowed to put up signs
conveying false information.

Lots of places have signs but no distinct government. I think I've seen
"England" on signs, and even "London" is rather complex concept to pin
down as a specific "thing".

The late and unlamented Humbers*de put up signs saying "England's newest
county", but presumably the unloved concept was no different in age to
Avon etc.

West Midlands, on the other hand, still exists. It does not have a
council, but it does have county agencies with members indirectly
elected from the city and borough councils. The effective and popular
Centro transit authority is one. Oh, Mr Cameron, I didn't notice you there.

John B wrote:
On Jul 18, 7:57 pm, Arthur Figgis wrote:
Lots of places have signs but no distinct government. I think I've seen
"England" on signs, and even "London" is rather complex concept to pin
down as a specific "thing".

England exists, legally, though - e.g. the Department of [English]
Health.

London is easy: the Corporation's area is the City of London, the GLA
area is Greater London, and there isn't anything else.

--
John Band
john at johnband dot org
www.johnband.org

Thanks, mate. I get so tired of telling people that Watford is not in
London, or, conversely, a motorway service area.

Free Lunch wrote:
On Sat, 18 Jul 2009 17:49:21 -0700 (PDT), John B
wrote in misc.transport.urban-transit:

On Jul 18, 7:57 pm, Arthur Figgis wrote:
Lots of places have signs but no distinct government. I think I've seen
"England" on signs, and even "London" is rather complex concept to pin
down as a specific "thing".
England exists, legally, though - e.g. the Department of [English]
Health.

London is easy: the Corporation's area is the City of London, the GLA
area is Greater London, and there isn't anything else.

Does the GLA cover all of urbanized area and adjacent suburbs?

No: see the reply which should come in above. And I think you mean
adjacent towns.

David Hansen wrote:
On Sat, 18 Jul 2009 15:05:11 +0100 someone who may be "Basil Jet"
wrote this:-

Middlesex exists, it just isn't recognised by the national government.

There is still a cricket club with that name, a university and the
post office know where it is.




The post office know where it is because they have to. You are not
supposed to put /any/ counties, never mind defunct ones, but people
simply do not pay attention.

On 19 July, 04:57, Charles Ellson wrote:
On Sat, 18 Jul 2009 11:15:31 -0700 (PDT), MIG





wrote:
On 18 July, 18:55, David Hansen
wrote:
On Sat, 18 Jul 2009 15:05:11 +0100 someone who may be "Basil Jet"
wrote this:-

Middlesex exists, it just isn't recognised by the national government..

There is still a cricket club with that name, a university and the
post office know where it is.

This where someone usually pops up saying that the current boundaries
are just "administrative boundaries", implying that past
administrative boundaries somehow delimit real places in a different
way.

They are all administrative boundaries. *I tend to think that current
boundaries and authorities are the only ones worth worrying about,
because they are current.

Don't get a job dealing with land or associated legal documentation
where many of the related entities have not been "current" for many
years.-

Any relevant powers will have been delegated elsewhere though, surely.

Many legal documents will have been signed by people who are dead, but
it's no good asking dead people for authority to do anything.

As for place names, down my way a lot of stuff is named after St
John. Does this prove that he still exists?

"Mizter T" wrote in message



To an extent, Middlesex exists as a place in the sense that people
think it exists - in that sense it's much like any other place name.
There's all those many things named after Middlesex of course -
there's Middlesex County Cricket Club for example, and there's also
North Middlesex and West Middlesex hospitals (and there was (Central)
Middlesex Hospital, now merged with UCH). Middlesex also continued to
exist as a postal county up until the Royal Mail abandoned the notion
of postal counties, so properly addressed letters included Middlesex
on the last line (this issue is somewhat complicated as a good chunk
of metropolitan Middlesex was already in the London postal district).

I'm still forced to use Middlesex as part of my address by Web forms
that have a mandatory 'County' field.

On Jul 19, 1:49*am, John B wrote:

On Jul 18, 7:57*pm, Arthur Figgis wrote:

Lots of places have signs but no distinct government. I think I've seen
"England" on signs, and even "London" is rather complex concept to pin
down as a specific "thing".

England exists, legally, though - e.g. the Department of [English]
Health.

Rubbish - see Charles Ellson's answer. The Department of Health has a
whole number of UK-wide responsibilities as well as its (primary)
responsibility for healthcare in England and Wales.

England does of course exist legally - though there are a number of
areas where a reference to England is actually an abbreviated
reference to England *and* Wales (e.g. reference to contracts being
enforced according to "English law" in "English courts"). In the past
one could have said that constitutionally Wales was basically part of
England, but with devolution this description would be less apt.


London is easy: the Corporation's area is the City of London, the GLA
area is Greater London, and there isn't anything else.

Yes there is. There's the London postal district - and there's a whole
number of places within Greater London that are outwith the London
postal district (e.g. in the south east fringes there's lots of places
with "Bromley" as the post town and hence BRx postcodes - back when
the postal county was properly included as part of the address, these
places would have had Kent in their address too, and many people still
continue to include it).

Sewardstone, near Epping Forest, meanwhile is outside Greater London
but has a London postcode - E4.

The London telephone dialling code 020 covers a larger area than the
London postal district, including many places outside of Greater
London. Meanwhile other places on the edges of Greater London have
dialling codes other than 020 London.

The Met Police District used to cover an area larger than Greater
London, but this was rationalised when the GLA was created and these
areas were transferred to the appropriate home counties police force.

The London fares (aka Travelcard) zones of course cover an area larger
than Greater London - and that's the case even if we're only talking
about the 'proper' zones 1-6.

I think there's a number of other examples where an official or quasi-
official body of one sort or another defines London in different ways.

On Jul 19, 7:52*am, Martin Edwards wrote:

David Hansen wrote:
On Sat, 18 Jul 2009 15:05:11 +0100 someone who may be "Basil Jet"
wrote this:-

Middlesex exists, it just isn't recognised by the national government.

There is still a cricket club with that name, a university and the
post office know where it is.

The post office know where it is because they have to. *You are not
supposed to put /any/ counties, never mind defunct ones, but people
simply do not pay attention.

*Total nonsense* - postal counties are not required any more, but
nowhere do the Royal Mail state that they should not appear as part of
an address. The Royal Mail is happy for information that is "postally
not required" (their phrase) to appear in an address, just so long as
the required information is given clearly - that is house number or
name and street, and also post town and postcode. (Of course even if
one omits the post town then it'll get through, especially if one is
posting from within that post town - e.g. London.)

On Jul 19, 7:43*am, Martin Edwards wrote:

John B wrote:
On Jul 17, 8:52 pm, Bruce wrote:
There is a huge variation around the country in the local authorities'
requirements for minicabs. *I have a friend who use to run a minicab
business in Aylesbury, but now runs a similar business in Middlesex.

Time traveller, is he?

(for m.t.u-t'ers, Middlesex hasn't existed for 44 years)

Right. *Yet people still give it as a postal address, even though you
are not supposed to give either district or county. *Another favourite
is Kingston, Surrey. *Oh no it isn't.

Oh yes it can be.

As I said above, please show me where including former postal counties
is specifically prohibited by Royal Mail - any reference or cite from
an official document would do.

You won't be able to, because Royal Mail do not prohibit its usage,
nor indeed do they officially discourage it either.

The Royal Mail is happy for information that is "postally not
required" to appear as part of an address, just so long as the
required information is there as well.

In message , at 10:54:15 on
Sun, 19 Jul 2009, Recliner remarked:
I'm still forced to use Middlesex as part of my address by Web forms
that have a mandatory 'County' field.

I filled in a web form this morning that insisted I add a county to the
already declared NG postcode and Nottingham as "town" (the added irony
being that their own "get address from postcode" utility had left the
County blank!!)
--
Roland Perry