Hertfordshire


 * For the similarly named county in the region, see .

[[Media:UK-Herts.ogg|Hertfordshire]] (pronounced [] or [], abbreviated as Herts) is an inland  in  and one of the. The of the name is the  heort ford, meaning  crossing (of a watercourse). Deer feature prominently in many county emblems.

Hertfordshire has a dating back to the. The area was first farmed during the, and permanent habitation appeared at the beginning of the. This was followed by tribes settling in the area during the. Following the in, Hertfordshire adapted quickly to the Roman way of life, and one of the new towns, , became the third largest town in. After the Romans left Britain, the occupied the area, creating their own towns, including the county town of. After the of, Hertfordshire was used for some of the new Norman castles at  and. As grew bigger, Hertfordshire became conveniently close to the English capital, and much of the area was owned by the  and, and this  helped to boost the local economy. However, the biggest boost to Hertfordshire came during the, after which the population rose dramatically. In, became the world's first , and  became the first Hertfordshire town to redevelop under the.

Geography
Hertfordshire is located immediately to the north of, and is part of the. Much of the county is part of the. To the east of Hertfordshire is, to the west is and to the north are  and.

The highest point in the county is 803 feet (245 m) above sea level, a quarter mile (400 m) from the village of near. The county motto, is "Trust and fear not". As part of a 2002 marketing campaign, the plant conservation charity Plantlife chose the as Hertfordshire's.

History
Hertfordshire was originally the area assigned to a fortress constructed at under the rule of  in 913. The name Hertfordshire appears in the in 1011.

The recorded the county as having nine s.   and  became one, Dacorum. The other seven were, , , , , and.

Hertfordshire is the starting point of the : a man made waterway, opened in 1613 to supply with fresh drinking water.

In 1965 under the  and  were abolished and their area was transferred to  to form part of the present-day. At the same time the of  was transferred to Hertfordshire.

From the until the late, the town of  was home to one of the major British  complexes, including the. Many well known films were made here: for example, all the Harry Potter films were made at Leavesden Studios near Watford.

In early December the  occurred at the.

In, the Hertfordshire town of will host the canoe and kayak slalom events of the.

Economy
This is a chart of trend of regional gross value added of Hertfordshire at current basic prices published (pp.240-253) by Office for National Statistics with figures in millions of British Pounds Sterling.

Hertfordshire has headquarters of many large well-known UK companies. is home to. are based in. the radio maker is based in. is in Watford. and are made in. and are in. Hatfield used to be connected with the aircraft industry, as it was where developed the first commercial jet liner, the Comet. Now the site is a business park and new campus for the University of Hertfordshire. This major new employment site is home to, among others,, and. A subsidiary of, and  in , , develops s. In the same town  produces satellites.

The loss of aircraft manufacture at Hatfield is just one of a number of industrial losses as companies capitalise on land values and move to regions where land is cheaper and recruitment is easier. Examples include, (formerly of Watford), (Hemel Hempstead) and  (also Hemel). In general, the land thus freed has been used for housing or service industries.

Transport
Hertfordshire lies across routes between London and the North, the North-West and the Midlands and as a consequence it is well-served by road and rail routes and, in the past, by canals.

Road
The county has always been traversed by some of the principal roads in England, originally the to Yorkshire and Scotland,  to North Wales,  to north-west England and the  to the Midlands and now the, ,  and the.

Rail
Principal rail routes lie through Stevenage to Yorkshire and Scotland, and through Watford to the Midlands, Wales, the north-west and Glasgow. Lesser routes serve St Albans (and the East Midlands) and Royston (to Cambridge and Norwich). Commuter routes supplement the through routes and the extends to Watford.

Air
There is an international airport at and another just outside the county at. At Elstree, there is a busy airfield for light aircraft.

Canals
The passes west Hertfordshire, through Watford, Hemel Hempstead and Berkhamsted.

Natural resouces
Despite the spread of built areas, much of the county is given over to agriculture, mainly arable. One product, now largely defunct, was, supported by reliable, clean rivers.

Some quarrying of sand and gravel occurs in the St Albans area. In the past, clay has supplied local brick-making.

Fresh water is supplied to London from Ware, using the built by. Most of the county's own supply comes from the chalk. Local rivers, although small, supported developing industries such as paper production at.

Education
Hertfordshire has an entirely comprehensive system in its state schools, with 26 independent schools and 73 state schools. All state schools have sixth forms, and there are few tertiary colleges and no s. The state schools do well, but performance of schools is far from uniform, and barely looks 'comprehensive' per se in some districts, specifically Watford, Hertsmere and St Albans. Watford's separate Grammar Schools for Girls and although comprehensive get results very similar to their namesake grammar schools, with the other two schools in the district being low performing. Overall, Hertfordshire gets 53.7% of pupils achieving 5 GCSEs at grades A-C including English and Maths. The average for England is 45.8%. St Albans has the highest school population, with Watford the lowest (four schools). The best performing state schools at GCSE are the two non-selective Watford Grammar Schools, followed by in, ,  in , , , ,  in  and. The worst performing school is Bushey Hall School. There are no bad schools in the Three Rivers district, and overall at GCSE, Hertfordshire does much better than many parts of England. At A-level, it has some good schools with the top three being in Bishop's Stortford,  in Harpenden, and. For all types of school at A-level, the best school is the independent near Rickmansworth, followed by. Although at GCSE, Hertfordshire is much better than many areas, at A level if looked at overall, it performs under the England average due to wide variation over the county.

Average score at GCSE by council district (%)
% of pupils gaining 5 grades A-C including English and Maths in 2006; compare to average house price by district.
 * Three Rivers 76.1
 * East Hertfordshire 64.9
 * St Albans 62.6
 * Watford 58.0
 * North Hertfordshire 56.0
 * Hertsmere 49.6
 * Dacorum 48.1
 * Welwyn Hatfield 46.3
 * Broxbourne 45.1
 * Stevenage 41.0

Geology
The rocks of Hertfordshire belong to the great shallow known as the. The beds dip in a south-easterly direction towards the syncline's lowest point roughly under the. The most important formations are the, which is exposed as  the high ground in the north and west of the county and the younger ,  and ,  which occupy the remaining southern part. The eastern half of the county was covered by glaciers during the and has a superficial layer of glacial s.

Urban areas
These are the main towns in Hertfordshire. For a complete list of settlements see .