Born in Ashton-upon-Mersey, the son of a Manchester stockbroker, Abercrombie was one of nine children. He attended Uppingham School and become an apprenticed to architects in Manchester.
In 1907 he was offered a post as junior lecturer and studio instructor at the University of Liverpool School of Architecture, where later he became professor of civic design from 1915 to 1935. During those twenty years Abercrombie produced a multitude of studies and reports on many areas in England and Wales, and, during his Presidency of the Town Planning Institute, published The Preservation of Rural England (1926) which led to the formation of the Council for the Preservation of Rural England (CPRE).
He then moved to University College, London, where he was professor of town planning from 1935 to 1946. He won the 1913 competition for replanning Dublin and wrote the standard prewar textbook Town and Country Planning (1933)
Abercrombie, in association with John Henry Forshaw (1895–1973), was appointed to prepare a plan for post-war rebuilding in the County of London, and was also given the task of planning the whole area around the County.
His first London plan was extended in 1944, with the help of a team of specialists, to The Greater London Plan, which was influential in planning the transport, population, distribution, industry, green belt, and other amenities of Greater London.
He prepared plans for other UK towns and regions including Edinburgh, Plymouth, Hull, Bath, Bristol, Sheffield, Bournemouth, and West Midlands.
Leslie Patrick Abercrombie: English town planner
