Editing Middlesex (section)

===Metropolitan challenges===
[[File:Map_of_Middlesex.jpg|thumb|right|County of Middlesex ({{small|{{Circa|1891–1895}}}})]]
{{Further|Population of Middlesex (1801–1881)}}
By the 19th century, the [[East End of London]] had expanded to the eastern boundary with Essex, and the [[Tower division]], an area which approximated to the East End, had reached a population of over a million.<ref name=vic_pop/> When the railways were built, the north western suburbs of London steadily spread over large parts of the county.<ref name=wolmar/> The areas closest to London were served by the [[Metropolitan Police]] from 1829, and from 1840 the entire county was included in the [[Metropolitan Police District]].<ref name=met>Order in Council enlarging the Metropolitan Police District (SI 1840 5001)</ref>

Local government in the county was unaffected by the [[Municipal Corporations Act 1835]], and civic works continued to be the responsibility of the individual parish vestries or ''ad hoc'' [[improvement commissioners]].<ref>''Local Government Areas 1834 -1945'', V D Lipman, Oxford, 1949</ref><ref>[[Joseph Fletcher (statistician)|Joseph Fletcher]], ''The Metropolis; its Boundaries, Extent, and Divisions for Local Government'' in ''Journal of the Statistical Society of London'', Vol. 7, No. 2. (June 1844), pp. 103–143.</ref> From 1855, the parishes of the densely populated area in the south east, but excluding the City of London, came within the responsibility of the [[Metropolitan Board of Works]] for certain infrastructure purposes, though the area remained a part of Middlesex.<ref name=saint/> Despite this innovation, the system was described by commentators at the time as one "in chaos".<ref name=barlow/>