the company's annual guide. The 1924 Metro-land guide describes Wembley Park as "rapidly developed of recent years as a residential district", pointing out that there are several golf courses within a few minutes journey of it. One of the earliest Metroland developments was a 123-acre one at Chalkhill, within the curtilage of Humphry Repton’s Wembley Park. Metropolitan Railway Country Estates acquired the land shortly after it was created and began selling plots in 1921. The railway even put in a siding to bring building materials to the estate. The British Empire Exhibition further encouraged suburban development and could be said to have put Wembley on the map once again as a desirable location. Wembley’s sewerage was improved, many roads in the area were straightened and widened and new bus services began operating. Visitors were introduced to Wembley and some later moved to the area when houses had been built to accommodate them. Between 1921 and 1928 season ticket sales at Wembley Park and neighbouring Metropolitan stations rose by over 700%. Like much of the rest of West London, most of Wembley Park and its environs was built over, largely with relatively low-density suburban housing, by 1939. This population was served by a new 1,500 seater cinema, the Elite, later (from 1930) Capitol, which opened on 21 March 1928. The cinema was situated in the British Empire Exhibition's former conference hall on Raglan Gardens (today Empire Way). Film and television studios In 1926 British Talking Pictures opened The Wembley Park Studios in what had been the British Empire Exhibition’s fine dining restaurant. When rebuilt in the late 1920s, Wembley Studios would become Britain's first purpose-built sound stages, though it was seriously damaged in a fire in October 1929, not long after it had opened. Perhaps due to the fire, the studio was never as successful as envisaged. It was taken over by Twentieth Century Fox to make 'quota-quickies', and then went into decline during and after the Second World War. In 1955 Wembley Film Studio was taken over by Associated-Rediffusion, ITV’s weekday broadcasters for London. Rediffusion added a new £1,000,000 television studio, which at the time was the largest in Europe. The Beatles performed there several times, notably on 28 April 1964. In 1968 Rediffusion lost its franchise. London Weekend Television continued to use the studio, but it went into decline until it was taken over by Fountain Studios in 1993.