Industrial district
Industrial district was initially introduced as a term to describe an area where workers of a monolithic heavy industry (ship-building, coal mining, steel, ceramics, etc.) live within walking-distance of their places of work.
In England, such areas were usually characterized by block streets of Victorian terraced housing, often with the giant industrial structures looming over the houses. Very few working industrial districts are now left. In England they survive only in places like Stoke-on-Trent and a few mining towns where the pits have escaped the closures of the 1980s. Many such districts were notable for having a strong children's street culture.
History of the term
The term was used by Alfred Marshall in his The Principles of Economics (1890, 1922). Marshall talks of a.... "thickly peopled industrial district".
The term was also used in political struggle. The 1917 handbook of the Industrial Workers of the World states:-
The term also appears in English literature. For instance, in a short story of 1920 by D. H. Lawrence, You Touched Me (aka 'Hadrian'):-