I came here 20 years ago with my wife simply because we didn't have any money. We'd had three children by then, so we moved out, down the sort of price scale which coincided, by and large, with the distance from London, and found a small house here.
Suburbs are nice places to bring up kids in England.
I stayed on here out of inertia once the kids went to schools and all the rest of it. Also, it's a great place to work. Whereas the suburbs are, comparatively speaking, new. Your imagination might be taken from you by some passing merchandise corporation or what have you.