High Wycombe

Coordinates: 51°37′43″N 0°44′54″W / 51.628661°N 0.748238°W / 51.628661; -0.748238

High Wycombe (/ˌhaɪ ˈwɪkəm/), often referred to as Wycombe, is a large town in Buckinghamshire, England. It is 29 miles (47 km) west north west of Charing Cross in London; this information is also engraved on the Corn Market building in the centre of the town. According to the 2011 census High Wycombe has a population of 120,256 making it the second largest town in the county of Buckinghamshire after Milton Keynes. The High Wycombe Urban Area, the conurbation of which the town is the largest component, has a population of 133,204.

High Wycombe is mostly an unparished area in the Wycombe district. Part of the urban area constitutes the civil parish of Chepping Wycombe, which had a population of 14,455 according to the 2001 census – this parish represents that part of the ancient parish of Chepping Wycombe which was outside the former municipal borough of Wycombe.

Wycombe is a combination of industrial and market town, with a traditional emphasis on furniture production. There has been a market held in the High Street since at least the Middle Ages.

Wycombe (UK Parliament constituency)

Wycombe /ˈwɪkəm/ is a constituency represented in the House of Commons of the UK Parliament since 2010 by Steve Baker, a Conservative.

History

Wycombe has continuously returned MPs since the Model Parliament of 1295. As a parliamentary borough (often referred to as High Wycombe or Chepping Wycombe), it returned two MPs until 1868 and then one until its abolition in 1885. The name was then transferred to a new county division, formally known as the "Wycombe division of Buckinghamshire".

Constituency profile

The constituency shares similar borders with Wycombe local government district, although it covers a slightly smaller area. The main town within the constituency, High Wycombe contains many working/middle class voters and a sizeable ethnic minority population that totals around one quarter of the town's population, with some census output areas of town home to over 50% ethnic minorities. The surrounding villages which account for just under half of the electorate are some of the most wealthy areas in the country with extremely low unemployment, and high incomes. Workless claimants totalled 3.0% of the population in November 2012, lower than the national average of 3.8%.

RAF High Wycombe

RAF High Wycombe is a Royal Air Force station, situated in the village of Walters Ash, near High Wycombe in Buckinghamshire, England. It houses Headquarters Air Command, and was originally designed to house RAF Bomber Command in the late 1930s. The station is also the headquarters of the European Air Group.

The location of the station was originally suggested by Wing Commander Alan Oakeshott when the Air Ministry was seeking a new, secure, site for Bomber Command away from London. Wing Commander Oakeshott was killed in combat in 1942 and is commemorated on the Naphill war memorial and in the name of the station's welfare centre, opened in 2011.

The motto of RAF High Wycombe in Latin is 'Non Sibi', which translates as 'not for ourselves'.

History

Construction

Prior to the outbreak of the Second World War, the Air Ministry sought a safe location for RAF Bomber Command away from London. The wooded area near Naphill, Walters Ash and Lacey Green was suggested by Wing Commander Alan Oakeshott as ideal for this purpose, since the trees could provide natural camouflage from the air.