Regeneration puts Cricklewood on the map: a new transport link, schools and parks put micro-neighbourhood in the spotlight

Cricklewood in north-west London attracts people who have outgrown their West Hampstead flat or Queen’s Park cottage and want space and value.

Upsizers can expand to a family house in the credible-sounding NW2 postcode less than four miles from Marble Arch — as they buy into an area on the up.

Now a £4.5 billion redevelopment of railway land is bringing 7,500 new homes, three new schools and four parks, plus a new Thameslink station giving locals a 12-minute commute to central London.

The railway looms large in Cricklewood’s history. The area came of age in the 1880s when Midland Railway Company moved its locomotive works from Kentish Town to Brent Sidings and built an estate of railway workers’ cottages, now coveted private homes.

Regeneration is creating a new town centre for the area, with a new high street leading to a revamped shopping district at Brent Cross.

The high street will pass through public squares and over a “Living Bridge”, a new cycle and pedestrian route across the North Circular road.

Check out the quieter streets and conservation areas either side of the Broadway, and the roads surrounding 86-acre Gladstone Park, close to Dollis Hill.

Gladstone Village is a new microneighbourhood at the edge of the park where housing association Octavia Living is selling stylish houses aimed at young families, priced from £775,000.

Two-bedroom flats cost from £550,000, with shared-ownership options available. Call 020 8459 1133.