page_title: Uxbridge
section_title: Urban development
hierarchical_section_title: Uxbridge / History / Urban development
caption_attribution_description: English: Uxbridge Common A registered common of 5.2 hectares, mainly grassed open space but along the northern edge there is an area of acid grassland and gorse.
context_page_description: Uxbridge is a suburban town in west London, and the administrative headquarters of the London Borough of Hillingdon. 15.4 miles west-northwest of Charing Cross, it is one of the major metropolitan centres identified in the London Plan. Uxbridge historically formed part of the parish of Hillingdon in the county of Middlesex, and was a significant local commercial centre from an early time. As part of the suburban growth of London in the 20th century it expanded and increased in population, becoming a municipal borough in 1955, and has formed part of Greater London since 1965. It is a significant retail and commercial centre, and is the location of Brunel University London and the Uxbridge campus of Buckinghamshire New University. The town is close to the boundary with Buckinghamshire, which is locally the River Colne.
  Several historical events have taken place in and around the town, including attempted negotiations between King Charles I and the Parliamentary Army during the English Civil War. The public house at the centre of those events, since renamed the Crown & Treaty, still stands.
context_section_description: The enclosure of Hillingdon Parish in 1819 saw the reduction in size of Uxbridge Common, which at its largest had been 4 miles (6.4 km) in circumference. The common originally covered both sides of Park Road to the north of the town centre but now covers 15 acres (6.1 ha).
  In 1871 the town's first purpose-built police station was built in Windsor Street. The building included three cells and stables. The Metropolitan Police continued to use the building until 1988, when operations moved to a new site in Harefield Road. The building subsequently became the Old Bill public house in 1996, renamed the Fig Tree in 2006.
  In the early 1900s the Uxbridge and District Electricity Supply Company had been established in Waterloo Road, and much of the town was connected by 1902, although some houses still had gas lighting in 1912. A water tower on Uxbridge Common was built in 1906, resembling a church tower, to improve the supply to the town.
  Wood panelling from a room in the Crown & Treaty public house was sold in 1924 to an American businessman, who installed it in his office in the Empire State Building in New York. It was returned in 1953 as a gift to the newly crowned Queen Elizabeth II and returned to the house, although the monarch retained ownership.
  On 31 August 1935 Uxbridge Lido, an outdoor swimming pool built in the "Moderne" or Art Deco style, was officially opened. Before the opening, many residents swam in a section of the Frays River near Harefield Road, and the Colne. The pool, pavilion building, entrance building and both fountains were designated Grade II listed buildings in 1998. Despite the listing, the pool was closed to the public and the buildings became subject to heavy vandalism. Uxbridge open-air pool was fully refurbished during 2009 and re-opened in May 2010. Added to the site, now named Hillingdon Sports and Leisure Complex, is a 50 m indoor competition pool, a leisure pool, a 100-station gym, a wide range of exercise classes, an athletics stadium and track, 3G floodlit pitches, a sports hall, a café and a crèche. The Grade II listed buildings are still standing.
  During the Second World War Uxbridge adopted the Royal Navy destroyer HMS Intrepid in 1942, to help towards the ship's costs; Intrepid was lost to enemy action the following year. The town and surrounding areas suffered bombing by the Luftwaffe. V1 flying bombs fell on the town between June 1944 and March 1945. The first recorded bombing using a V1 was on 22 June 1944 at 07:00, when the bomb passed over the top of a bus and hit four houses nearby. Seven people were killed and 25 injured, leaving 46 houses in the area uninhabitable. In all the Uxbridge Urban District suffered 79 civilian deaths through enemy action in the war.
  In 1958 the 199-acre (81 ha) Lowe & Shawyer plant nursery to the west of RAF Uxbridge entered voluntary liquidation. The nursery had stood in Kingston Lane since 1868, and was the largest producer of cut flowers in the country. Demolition work began in 1962, and the construction of Brunel University commenced. Chrysanthemums are included the coat of arms of the Borough of Uxbridge in memory of the nursery. The Uxbridge (Vine Street) railway branch line, which partly ran alongside the site, was closed in 1964 and in 1966 the university opened, purchasing the land where the railway had run from the local council for £65,000.
  The Uxbridge Cricket Club moved from Cricketfield Road in 1971 to make way for the new Civic Centre. The club had been at Cricketfield Road since 1858, but moved to a new site on part of Uxbridge Common on Park Road. The Market Square shopping precinct in the town centre was built in the late 1970s, but its lack of shelter made it unpopular and it did not attract the expected levels of custom. Many buildings along the High Street and Windsor Street had been demolished to make way for the new precinct, which was eventually sold to the Prudential Assurance Company and redeveloped with a roof in the early 1980s to become the Pavilions Shopping Centre. The Peacock public house in one of the two main squares 
caption: Uxbridge Common was reduced in size by the 1819 Inclosure of Hillingdon Parish.
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