NEGEN

I remember seeing a road map of the United Kingdom once and wondering why almost every single road eventually seemed to make its way to the massive urban sprawl of London in the country's southeast. Even cities as far away as Inverness in Scotland or Belfast in Northern Ireland seemed to inevitably revolve around the massive capital. Having such a dominance on the country, I can see why other distant communities are gradually losing interest in the political and economic influences London still has on them, especially if other closer urban centers are greatly growing in population and influence. The recent election for Scotland's independence from England shows that even today many people are looking to branch out away from London's reach, and that these reasons are perhaps not totally influenced by historic tensions and rivalries between the two places. Populations centers like Birmingham and Manchester have grown immensely in the last decade, and with that has came a growing independent sense of culture and identity as well. Residents in smaller towns and villages feel that these other closer  urban areas would be a better representative of them in country-wide politics than distant London. Some of these distant communities are nearly 500 miles away from London. That is like Detroit, Michigan being politically and economically dominated by New York City. Even with London being massive in size and influential reach, I can see why far away towns in the U.K. don't always consider London too important.