These settlements had an extensive historical record since the Norman conquest; detailed archaeological investigations before development revealed evidence of human occupation from the Neolithic period, including the Milton Keynes Hoard of Bronze Age gold jewellery.

Recognising how traditional towns and cities had become choked in traffic, they established a grid of distributor roads about 1 kilometre (0.62 mi) between edges, leaving the spaces between to develop more organically.

Most major sports are represented at amateur level; Red Bull Racing (Formula One), MK Dons (association football), and Milton Keynes Lightning (ice hockey) are its professional teams.

The site was deliberately located equidistant from London, Birmingham, Leicester, Oxford, and Cambridge,[20][21] with the intention that it would be self-sustaining and eventually become a major regional centre in its own right.

[31] This non-hierarchical devolved city plan was a departure from the English new towns tradition and envisaged a wide range of industry and diversity of housing styles and tenures.

[33] The radical grid plan was inspired by the work of Melvin M. Webber,[34] described by the founding architect of Milton Keynes, Derek Walker, as the 'father of the city'.

On 15 August 2022, the Crown Office announced formally that Queen Elizabeth II had ordained by letters patent that the Borough of Milton Keynes has been given city status.

Before construction began, every area was subject to detailed archaeological investigation: this work has provided an insight into the history of a very large sample of the landscape of south-central England.

[52][53] The most notable archaeological artefact was the Milton Keynes Hoard, which the British Museum described as 'one of the biggest concentrations of Bronze Age gold known from Britain and seems to flaunt wealth.

In 1980, the then president of the Royal Town Planning Institute, Francis Tibbalds, described Central Milton Keynes as "bland, rigid, sterile, and totally boring.

[70] The geography of Milton Keynes – the railway line, Watling Street, Grand Union Canal, M1 motorway – sets up a very strong north-south axis.

[76] In contrast, the later districts planned by English Partnerships have departed from this model, without a road hierarchy but with conventional junctions with traffic lights and at grade pedestrian crossings.

[89][l] The flood plains of the Great Ouse and of its tributaries (the Ouzel and some brooks) have been protected as linear parks that run right through Milton Keynes; these were identified as important landscape and flood-management assets from the outset.

As a key element of the planners' vision,[104] Milton Keynes has a purpose built centre, with a very large "covered high street" shopping centre,[105] a theatre,[106][107] municipal art gallery,[106][107] a multiplex cinema,[108] hotels,[109] central business district,[104] an ecumenical church,[110] Milton Keynes Civic Offices[111] and central railway station.

[113] The park is listed (grade 2) by Historic England,[114] Milton Keynes consists of many pre-existing towns and villages that anchored the urban design,[16] as well as new infill developments.

[52] Its station was an important junction (the London and North Western Railway with the Oxford-Cambridge Varsity Line), leading to the substantial urban growth in the town in the Victorian period.

[140] The Open University's headquarters are in the Walton Hall district; though because this is a distance learning institution, the only students resident on campus are approximately 200 full-time postgraduates.

As of 2023[update], Milton Keynes is the UK's largest population centre without its own conventional university, a shortfall that the Council aims to rectify.

[143] In June 2023, the Open University announced that it would "initiate work on the strategic and financial case to relocate [from] the OU's existing campus at Walton Hall to a new site adjacent to the central railway station" and possibly commence teaching full-time undergraduates.

[160] Other numerous public sculptures in Milton Keynes include work by Elisabeth Frink, Philip Jackson, Nicolas Moreton and Ronald Rae.

The most well-known of these is the Starship Technologies' (largely) autonomous delivery robots: Milton Keynes provided its world-first urban deployment of these units in 2018.

The Grand Union Canal, the West Coast Main Line, the A5 road and the M1 motorway provide the major axes that influenced the urban designers.

[190] Wolverton, Milton Keynes Central and Bletchley stations are on the West Coast Main Line and are served by local commuter services between London and Birmingham or Crewe.

[191] Bletchley, Fenny Stratford, Bow Brickhill, Woburn Sands and Aspley Guise railway stations are on the Marston Vale line to Bedford.

[192] Proximity to the M1 has led to construction of a number of distribution centres, including Magna Park at the south-eastern flank of Milton Keynes, near Wavendon and M1 J13.

[7] In 2014 and 2017, Milton Keynes ranked third in terms of contribution to the national economy, as measured by gross value added per worker, of the 63 largest conurbations in the UK.

[204] Milton Keynes is home to several national and international companies, notably Argos,[208] Domino's Pizza,[209] Marshall Amplification,[210] Mercedes-Benz,[211] Suzuki,[212] Volkswagen Group,[213] Red Bull Racing,[214] Network Rail,[215] and Yamaha Music Europe.

[224][225] On a visit to refurbishment and extension work on the YMCA building, Housing Minister Heather Wheeler declared that "Nobody in this day and age should be sleeping on the street".

[233] Because of the (poorly drained) clay soils and the urban hard surfaces, the development corporation identified water runoff into the Ouzel and its tributaries as a significant risk to be managed and so put in place two large balancing lakes (Caldecotte and Willen) and a number of smaller detention ponds.

[236] Just outside the Milton Keynes urban area lies Little Linford Wood, a conservation site and nature reserve managed by the Berkshire, Buckinghamshire and Oxfordshire Wildlife Trust.