Chartered Surveyors Ealing Greater London
Approximate Population: 312,300
Ealing is a town in the London Borough of Ealing. The most important changes to Ealing occurred in the 19th century. The building of the Great Western Railway in the 1830s, part of which passed through the centre of Ealing, led to the opening of a railway station on the Broadway in 1879. In the next few decades, much of Ealing was rebuilt, predominantly semi-detached housing designed for the rising middle-class.
Gas mains were laid and an electricity generating station was built. Better transport links, including horse buses as well as trains, enabled people to more easily travel to work in London. All this, whilst living in what was still considered to be the countryside. Although much of the countryside was rapidly disappearing during this period of rapid expansion, parts of it were preserved as public parks, such as Lammas Park and Ealing Common. Pitzhanger Manor and the extensive 28 acres (110,000 m2) grounds on which it stands, was sold to the council in 1901 by Sir Spencer Walpole, which had been bought by his father the Rt. Hon. Spencer Horatio Walpole and thus became Walpole Park.
It was during the Victorian period that Ealing became a town. This meant that roads had to be built, drainage provided, and schools & public buildings erected. The man responsible for much of all this was Charles Jones, Borough Surveyor from 1863–1913. He planted the horse chestnut trees on Ealing Common and designed the Town Hall, both the present one and the older structure which is now a bank (on the Mall). Ealing Broadway became a major shopping centre.
It was in 1901 that Ealing Urban District was incorporated as a municipal borough, Walpole Park was opened and the first electric trams ran along the Uxbridge Road — a mode of transport that Transport for London (TFL) tried to reintroduce some 110 years later in the form of the West London Tram scheme. This was abandoned in August 2007 in the face of fierce local opposition and a switch in priorities and funding to Crossrail.
