Southall

Southall made margarine, then sausages, then hung on to London's last horse market until 2007, long after the rest of the capital had stopped needing one. That is the whole temperament: busy, stubborn and in no hurry to become anybody's idea of a nice suburb. The Broadway is loud from breakfast until well past the hour a polite high street would have gone home, and buyers who wanted hanging baskets and a garden centre are reading the wrong page. The Elizabeth line will whisk you into central London, though people who move here for the station tend to find the high street was the point.