Belle Isle is a large suburb south of Leeds city centre, West Yorkshire, England. It is bounded to the north and east by the M621 motorway. The district lies in the LS10 Leeds postcode area. Belle Isle is part of the Middleton Park ward of Leeds City Council and Leeds Central parliamentary constituency. Etymology The name "Belle Isle" is first attested in the Rothwell parish register for 1762 as Newbell-ile, and then in 1763 as Belle Isle, situated at Middleton Wood End. The name is borrowed from that of the French island Belle Île, off the Breton coast, whose name is French for 'beautiful island'. The island was captured and held by British forces from 1761 to 1763 during the Seven Years' War, and this event inspired the naming of the Yorkshire settlement. There is also speculation that the name might be a pun on the place-name Bell Hill (which allegedly derives from the distinctive "bell" shaped early coal mining bell pits of the hilly area). History In the late eighteenth century, Belle Isle was just a small hamlet for workers at a colliery opposite Middleton Woods, near the current site of Middleton colliery railway. Belle Isle now consists largely of housing estates built on farming land by the local authority housing department during the clearance of slum dwellings and the expansion of Leeds in the early twentieth-century; some of these homes are now in private ownership. The estate is divided north to south by Belle Isle Road with the wide expanse of Belle Isle Circus lying at the centre of the estate. The majority of the homes in Belle Isle are red brick semi-detached houses although this stock has been added to over the years. The majority still belong to Leeds City Council and are managed locally by Belle Isle Tenant Management Organisation (TMO). BITMO is a not for profit housing company that is run by a tenant board. Some of the council estates of Belle Isle are listed below: Petersfield Avenue Windmill Road The Clearings Manor Farms (often debated as to whether this lies in Middleton) Newhall Road The Brooms The Aberfields The Lanshaws The Nesfields Demography Like the neighbouring communities of Beeston Hill, Holbeck and Middleton, Belle Isle is considered to be amongst the most deprived areas in the country. Examples of disadvantage found in the district include low educational attainment, low skill levels, and concerns about