In England, it is anecdotally remarked that the number of Greggs bakeries to be found in a town is a reliable measure of the area's 'Northern-ness'. Conversely, a commercial competitor to Greggs in the baked goods and sandwiches market, Pret-a-Manger, is reputed to be popular in more 'southern' areas of England. Using a Support Vector Machine and an Artificial Neural Network (ANN) Regression Model, the relative geographical distributions of Greggs and Pret have been utilised for the first time to quantify the North-South divide in England. The calculated dividing lines were each compared to another line, based on Gross Domestic Household Income (GDHI). The lines match remarkably well, and we conclude that this is likely because much of England's wealth is concentrated in London, as are most of England's Pret-a-Manger shops. Further studies were conducted based on the relative geographical distributions of popular supermarkets Morrisons and Waitrose, which are also considered to have a North-South association. This analysis yields different results. For all metrics, the North-South dividing line passes close to the M1 Watford Gap services. As a common British idiom, this location is oft quoted as one point along the English North-South divide, and it is notable that this work agrees. This tongue-in-cheek analysis aims to highlight more serious factors highlighting the North-South divide, such as life expectancy, education, and poverty.

翻译：在英格兰，民间流传一种说法：一个城镇中格雷格斯面包店的数量是衡量该地区“北方属性”的可靠指标。相反，格雷格斯在烘焙食品和三明治市场的商业竞争对手普莱特-曼哲据说在英格兰更偏“南方”的地区广受欢迎。本研究首次利用支持向量机和人工神经网络回归模型，基于格雷格斯与普莱特的相对地理分布对英格兰南北分界线进行量化。计算所得的分界线分别与基于家庭总收入总和的另一条分界线进行对比，结果高度吻合。我们认为这可能是因为英格兰大部分财富集中在伦敦，而绝大多数普莱特-曼哲门店也位于该地。进一步研究基于被视为具有南北关联的流行超市莫里森和维特罗斯的相对地理分布展开，但该分析得出不同结果。在所有指标中，南北分界线均邻近M1高速公路沃特福德峡服务区。作为常见的英国习语，该地点常被引述为英格兰南北分界线上的标志点，值得注意的是本研究结果与此一致。这项带有戏谑意味的分析旨在揭示影响南北分界线的更严肃因素，如预期寿命、教育和贫困问题。