About Milton Keynes


Milton Keynes was formally designated as a new town on January 23rd 1967 with the design brief to become a ‘city’ in scale.
At designation, it was 89 km2 (34 sq mi) area incorporated the existing towns of Bletchley, Wolverton and Stony Stratford, along with another 15 villages and farmland in between. Now it is 30,862 hectares or equivalent to 80,000 football fields.

Milton Keynes is divided into several small level areas of: 152 LSOAs; 48 parishes; 19 wards; 152 settlements/estates (PDF maps can be downloaded in the end of this page).

  • 1967 (new town): 60,000
  • Census 2001: 212,707
  • Census 2011: 249,895
  • Latest population and projection can be accessed in here.

The Milton Keynes Development Corporation planned the major road layout according to street hierarchy principles, using a grid pattern of approximately 1 km (0.62 mi) intervals, rather than on the more conventional radial pattern found in older settlements. Major internal roads run between communities, rather than through them: these distributor roads are known locally as grid roads and the spaces between them – the districts – are known as grid squares. Intervals of 1 km (0.62 mi) were chosen so that people would always be within walking distance of a bus stop. Consequently, each grid square is a semi-autonomous community, making a unique collective of 100 clearly identifiable neighbourhoods within the overall urban environment. The grid squares have a variety of development styles, ranging from conventional urban development and industrial parks to original rural and modern urban and suburban developments. Most grid squares have Local Centres, intended as local retail hubs and most with community facilities as well. Originally intended under the masterplan to sit alongside the Grid Roads, the Local Centres were mostly in fact built embedded in the communities.

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