civil and ecclesiastical administration. The boundaries of the hamlet, which later became the parish, are the only formally defined boundaries the area has had. The new parish took the Hamlet's boundaries, in this way it inherited Stepney's boundaries with Hackney to the north and the Stratford area of the parish of West Ham over the Lea to the east. The boundary with Bromley by Bow to the south ran along Bow Road, though it arced a little to the south near Bow Church and Bow Bridge. The western boundary, with what remained of Stepney ran in the vicinity of Coburn, Lyal and Driffild Roads, with further fission of the parish meaning the areas to the west become the independent parishes of Bethnal Green and Mile End Old Town. In 1900 Bow merged into the Metropolitan Borough of Poplar, together with Poplar and Bromley-by-Bow. The new Borough preserved the identities of the constituent areas through the names and boundaries of its electoral wards. The Civil Parish of Bow continued to operate until the abolition of the Poor Law in 1930, though London's Civil Parishes weren't formally abolished until the creation of the modern London Boroughs in 1965. The Metropolitan Boroughs of Poplar, Stepney and Bethnal Green united to form the London Borough of Tower Hamlets in 1965, meaning that Bow came to form the north-east part of the new borough. E3 Postal area Bow is closely associated with the E3 postcode area, formed in 1917, but post code areas were never intended to define districts. E3 excludes parts of the Bow parish area north of the Hertford Union Canal and extends far to the south of Bow Road to include most of Bromley by Bow – as far south as the Limehouse Cut. It reaches as far west as the Regents Canal to take in parts of Bethnal Green and Mile End, and stretches over the Lea to take in Three Mills and the Twelvetrees Business Park in the old parish of West Ham. Governance and representation Bow is the north-east part of the London Borough of Tower Hamlets For Planning Policy purposes, a Neighbourhood Plan is being prepared for an area referred to as Roman Road Bow. This area affected includes much of Bow and part of Mile End. The Neighbourhood Plan is intended to produce locally specific policies to complement the Tower Hamlets Local Plan. Roman Road Bow Neighbourhood