The London/Surrey boundary. Happy Valley

A SQUARE BY SQUARE LOOK AT LONDON
TQ 31 57 A rural area with scattered housing on the edge of common land

The London/Surrey/Croydon boundary. The boundary follows the south eastern edge of Coulsdon Common and then turns north west to meet the eastern edge of The Noswells. It then turns south east and crosses woodland and turns south west along the curved south edge of a belt of woodland.It then follows the eastern edge of Broad Wood

Post to the west Devilsden
Post to the east Caterham Barracks
Post to the south Chaldon


Sites on the London, Croydon side of the boundary
Broadwood

Coulsdon Common
The Common is marked on the Ordnance Survey map of 1816. The threat of enclosure led to it being taken over by the Corporation of London in the early 1880s.

Happy Valley
Some of the grounds of the original Parson’s Pightle used in the park. Taken over in 1937 under green belt legislation and assembled and renamed Happy Valley in 1970 – it had been the Coulsdon Green Belt Lands. The whole park is 250 acres with Happy Valley in the centre. Grazing once ad controlled the scrub but this stopped in 1937 and although in the 1950s some was leased to a farmer the scrub became invasive but was cleared in the 1960s. Today it is cut and trees are coppiced. On the western boundary are some large yews. It has been designated a SSSI.

Old Fox Close
The Fox . Pub on this site from at least 1720.

Piles Wood. Dominated by oak with ash and wild cherry. In the understorey is ground plants associated with ancient woodland like wood anemone, bluebells and lords and ladies.

The Noswells
The Noswells Farm Cottage

Sites on the Surrey, Tandridge side of the boundary

Dean Hill
Nuclear bomb store

Magazine Road
Happy Valley Golf Course

This material has been compiled over many years and from a wide variety of sources

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