Walton Hall is a district in Milton Keynes

Milton Keynes

Milton Keynes , sometimes abbreviated MK, is a large town in Buckinghamshire, in the south east of England, about north-west of London. It is the administrative centre of the Borough of Milton Keynes...

, in the English

England

England is a country that is part of the United Kingdom. It shares land borders with Scotland to the north and Wales to the west; the Irish Sea is to the north west, the Celtic Sea to the south west, with the North Sea to the east and the English Channel to the south separating it from continental...

 county

County

A county is a jurisdiction of local government in certain modern nations. Historically in mainland Europe, the original French term, comté, and its equivalents in other languages denoted a jurisdiction under the sovereignty of a count A county is a jurisdiction of local government in certain...

 of Buckinghamshire

Buckinghamshire

Buckinghamshire is a ceremonial and non-metropolitan home county in South East England. The county town is Aylesbury, the largest town in the ceremonial county is Milton Keynes and largest town in the non-metropolitan county is High Wycombe....

, and is the location of the campus and offices of The Open University. The University campus covers 48 hectare

Hectare

The hectare is a metric unit of area defined as 10,000 square metres , and primarily used in the measurement of land. In 1795, when the metric system was introduced, the are was defined as being 100 square metres and the hectare was thus 100 ares or 1/100 km2...

s and the first buildings were designed by Maxwell Fry

Maxwell Fry

Edwin Maxwell Fry, CBE, RA, FRIBA, FRTPI, known as Maxwell Fry , was an English modernist architect of the middle and late 20th century, known for his buildings in Britain, Africa and India....

 & Jane Drew

Jane Drew

Dame Jane Drew, DBE, FRIBA was an English modernist architect and town planner. She qualified at the AA School in London, and prior to World War II became one of the leading exponents of the Modern Movement in London....

 in 1969.

It is in the ancient (and modern) parish of Walton

Walton, Milton Keynes

Walton was a hamlet that is now a district and civil parish in Milton Keynes, ceremonial Buckinghamshire, England.The historic hamlet is located about four miles south of Central Milton Keynes and just east of Simpson, mostly along Walton Road in the modern Walnut Tree district...

. The manor house

Manor house

A manor house is a country house that historically formed the administrative centre of a manor, the lowest unit of territorial organisation in the feudal system in Europe. The term is applied to country houses that belonged to the gentry and other grand stately homes...

 (Walton Hall) that gives the district its name and the ancient parish church of St Michael, now deconsecrated, are in the University's grounds. The village farm-lands are divided between Walton Hall, the modern Walton, Kents Hill and Walnut Tree.

The manor house itself is currently home to certain administrative offices of The Open University; its cellar has been home to the Cellar Bar, a ratskeller, since the earliest days of the University. The bar, which was originally paid for out of the Bevan Fund, will be closing August 1, 2011, because it has been deemed not profitable by the university's Estates division.

Walton Hall is on the banks of the Ouzel

River Ouzel

The River Ouzel , also known as the River Lovat, is a river in England, and a tributary of the River Great Ouse. It rises in the Chiltern Hills and flows 20 miles north to join the Ouse at Newport Pagnell....

, a tributary of the Great Ouse, where a disused balancing lake

Balancing lake

A balancing lake is a term used in the U.K. describing an element of an urban drainage system used to control flooding by temporarily storing flood waters...

 has become naturalised and is home to reed

Phragmites

Phragmites, the Common reed, is a large perennial grass found in wetlands throughout temperate and tropical regions of the world. Phragmites australis is sometimes regarded as the sole species of the genus Phragmites, though some botanists divide Phragmites australis into three or four species...

s, bulrush

Typha

Typha is a genus of about eleven species of monocotyledonous flowering plants in the family Typhaceae. The genus has a largely Northern Hemisphere distribution, but is essentially cosmopolitan, being found in a variety of wetland habitats...

es, reed warbler

Reed Warbler

The Eurasian Reed Warbler, or just Reed Warbler, Acrocephalus scirpaceus, is an Old World warbler in the genus Acrocephalus. It breeds across Europe into temperate western Asia. It is migratory, wintering in sub-Saharan Africa....

, reed bunting

Reed Bunting

The Reed Bunting, Emberiza schoeniclus, is a passerine bird in the bunting family Emberizidae, a group now separated by most modern authors from the finches, Fringillidae....

, water rail

Water Rail

The Water Rail is a bird of the rail family which breeds in well-vegetated wetlands across Europe, Asia and North Africa. Northern and eastern populations are migratory, but this species is a permanent resident in the warmer parts of its breeding range...

, sparrowhawk, kestrel

Common Kestrel

The Common Kestrel is a bird of prey species belonging to the kestrel group of the falcon family Falconidae. It is also known as the European Kestrel, Eurasian Kestrel, or Old World Kestrel. In Britain, where no other brown falcon occurs, it is generally just called "the kestrel".This species...

, green woodpecker, grass snake

Grass Snake

The grass snake , sometimes called the ringed snake or water snake is a European non-venomous snake. It is often found near water and feeds almost exclusively on amphibians.-Etymology:...

 and many varieties of odonata

Odonata

Odonata is an order of insects, encompassing dragonflies and damselflies . The word dragonfly is also sometimes used to refer to all Odonata, but the back-formation odonate is a more correct English name for the group as a whole...

. Surrounding the reedbed are ponds and open water, ancient hedgerows and hay meadow.

See also

• Walton, Milton Keynes
  Walton, Milton Keynes
  Walton was a hamlet that is now a district and civil parish in Milton Keynes, ceremonial Buckinghamshire, England.The historic hamlet is located about four miles south of Central Milton Keynes and just east of Simpson, mostly along Walton Road in the modern Walnut Tree district...