Bracknell, Bracknell Forest, England, United Kingdom

Geography | Business | Rail | Road | Bus | Air | Education

🏴󠁧󠁢󠁥󠁮󠁧󠁿 Bracknell is a large town and civil parish in Berkshire, England, the westernmost area within the Greater London Urban Area and the administrative centre of the Borough of Bracknell Forest. It lies 11 miles (18 km) to the east of Reading, 9 miles (14 km) south of Maidenhead, 10 miles (16 km) south-west of Windsor and 25 miles (40 km) west of central London.

Originally a market village and part of the Windsor Great Forest, Bracknell experienced a period of huge growth during the mid 20th Century when it was declared a New Town. Planned at first for a population of 25,000, Bracknell New Town was further expanded in the late 1960s to accommodate a population of 60,000. As part of this expansion, Bracknell absorbed many of the surrounding hamlets including Easthampstead, Ramslade and Old Bracknell. It is a commercial centre and the UK headquarters for several technology companies.

The town is surrounded by Swinley Forest (up to Winkfield Row) and Crowthorne Woods on the east and south. The urban area has absorbed parts of many local outlying areas including Ascot, Warfield, Winkfield and Binfield.

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Geography The town covers areas previously in the parishes of Easthampstead, Warfield, Binfield and Winkfield. The town's centre lies just north of the railway station with completely pedestrianised and much undercover shopping around Princess Square, Charles Square and the Broadway. There are 'out-of-town' shops, a multiscreen cinema and ten pin bowling complex at the Peel Centre. Just to the west are the Western and Southern industrial estates, either side of the railway line. There are many residential suburbs (see settlement table below) of varying dates, the oldest being Priestwood and, of course, Easthampstead village.

The former RAF Staff College buildings in Harmans Water, now closed, was part of the Joint Services Command and Staff College. From 2008, the site was redeveloped for housing by Wimpey, with an estimated 730 houses. The south-western corner of the town remains rural around Easthampstead Park and the wooded Yew Tree Corner. However, a new housing development called Jennett's Park is currently being built (from 2007) at Peacock Farm and on part of what was historically the grounds of Easthampstead Park. There are large ponds at Farley Wood and the Easthampstead Mill Pond between Great Hollands and Wildridings, and two lakes at South Hill Park. The Bull Brook emerges above ground just within the bounds of the suburb of Bullbrook.

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Business The town is home to companies such as 3M, Panasonic, Egnyte, Fujitsu (formerly ICL), Dell, HP Inc., Hewlett Packard Enterprise, Micron Technology, Brocade Communications Systems, Siemens (originally Nixdorf), Riverbed, Honeywell, Intercall, Broadcom, Avnet Technology Solutions, Novell, Honda and Kleenway, a Royal Warrant holding chimney sweeping company based in Neuman Crescent. The Southern Industrial Area houses the head office of Waitrose. The 70-acre (280,000 m²) site which houses the Waitrose head office also houses the central distribution centre. Waitrose has operated from the town since the 1970s, with a recently added supermarket in the town centre in 2011.

Manufacturing industry has largely disappeared since the 1980s. Former significant sites included Clifford's Dairy in Downshire Way and British Aerospace (originally Sperry Gyroscope) now occupied by Arlington Square, a 22-acre (8 ha) business park of which the first stage was completed in 1995. The Thomas Lawrence brickworks on the north side of the town was famous for 'red rubber' bricks to be found in the Royal Albert Hall and Westminster Cathedral, and in restoration work at 10 Downing Street and Hampton Court Palace.

In the town centre was the 12-storey Winchester House, formerly owned by 3M who moved to new premises in Farley Wood on the town's northern edge in 2004. The building was demolished and has been replaced with a large block of flats The town was also the home of Racal and Ferranti Computer Systems Ltd. The Met Office maintained a large presence in the town until 2003, when it relocated to Exeter in Devon; however, the junction of the A329 and A3095 is still named the "Met Office Roundabout". Many businesses are located on the town's three industrial areas.

Easthampstead Park in the southern suburb of Easthampstead was a conference centre owned by Bracknell Forest Borough Council. In 2019 an agreement was made between the local authority and a hotel group, Active Hospitality. The building is now leased to the company and has reopened as a hotel

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Rail The town of Bracknell has two railway stations, Bracknell and Martins Heron, both of which are on the Waterloo to Reading Line, built by the London and South Western Railway and now operated by South Western Railway. Bracknell is a commuter centre with its residents travelling in both directions (westwards to Reading and eastwards to London Waterloo).

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Road The town has good road links and is situated at the end of the A329(M) motorway, midway between Junction 3 of the M3 and Junction 10 of the M4 motorways. A proposed motorway link between the M3 and the M4 to be called the M31 would have passed to the west of the town centre, but only the section that is now the A329(M) and the A3290 was built.

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Bus Bracknell bus station serves the town of Bracknell. The bus station is on The Ring in the Town Centre across the road from Bracknell railway station. The bus station consists of three long shelters each with three stands. Bus services go from Bracknell as far afield as Crowthorne, Camberley, Wokingham, Reading, Maidenhead, Windsor and Slough. Local bus services are provided by Thames Valley Buses and Reading Buses, who also provide the Green Line services to London Victoria and Heathrow Airport.

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Air Heathrow Airport is 13 miles (21 kilometres) east of Bracknell, accessible by train from Bracknell railway station. Green Line operates a bus from Heathrow Airport to Bracknell. Courtney Buses also services this route. Blackbushe Airport in Yateley is the nearest general aviation airport located 15 miles (24 kilometres) south-west of Bracknell.

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Education Bracknell and Wokingham College of further education is also based in the area. The Silwood Park campus of Imperial College London is five miles (eight kilometres) east of Bracknell town centre. The University of Reading is 8 mi (13 km) north-west, and Royal Holloway College is 8 mi (13 km) east.

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St Margaret Clitherow, Bracknell 
St Margaret Clitherow, Bracknell
Image: Michael FORD

Bracknell has a population of over 74,090 people. Bracknell also forms the centre of the wider Bracknell Forest District which has a population of over 122,549 people. It is estimated there are around 3,575 businesses in Bracknell.

To set up a UBI Lab for Bracknell see: https://www.ubilabnetwork.org Twitter: https://twitter.com/UBILabNetwork

Twin Towns, Sister Cities Bracknell has links with:

🇩🇪 Leverkusen, Germany 🇩🇪 Opladen, Germany
Text Atribution: Wikipedia Text under CC-BY-SA license

Antipodal to Bracknell is: 179.251,-51.416

Locations Near: Bracknell -0.749,51.416

🏴󠁧󠁢󠁥󠁮󠁧󠁿 Wokingham -0.84,51.41 d: 6.3  

🏴󠁧󠁢󠁥󠁮󠁧󠁿 Maidenhead -0.72,51.523 d: 12  

🏴󠁧󠁢󠁥󠁮󠁧󠁿 Farnborough -0.75,51.29 d: 14  

🏴󠁧󠁢󠁥󠁮󠁧󠁿 Windsor -0.612,51.482 d: 12  

🏴󠁧󠁢󠁥󠁮󠁧󠁿 Fleet -0.834,51.28 d: 16.3  

🏴󠁧󠁢󠁥󠁮󠁧󠁿 Woking -0.592,51.322 d: 15  

🏴󠁧󠁢󠁥󠁮󠁧󠁿 Aldershot -0.75,51.233 d: 20.3  

🏴󠁧󠁢󠁥󠁮󠁧󠁿 Slough -0.588,51.508 d: 15.2  

🏴󠁧󠁢󠁥󠁮󠁧󠁿 Runnymede -0.541,51.395 d: 14.6  

🏴󠁧󠁢󠁥󠁮󠁧󠁿 High Wycombe -0.748,51.629 d: 23.7  

Antipodal to: Bracknell 179.251,-51.416

🇳🇿 Christchurch 172.617,-43.517 d: 19006  

🇳🇿 Dunedin 170.474,-45.884 d: 19125.1  

🇳🇿 Canterbury 171.58,-43.543 d: 18968.2  

🇳🇿 Masterton 175.664,-40.95 d: 18819.4  

🇳🇿 Wellington 174.767,-41.283 d: 18837.6  

🇳🇿 Hutt 174.917,-41.217 d: 18833.7  

🇳🇿 Lower Hutt 174.917,-41.217 d: 18833.7  

🇳🇿 Upper Hutt 175.05,-41.133 d: 18827.5  

🇳🇿 Porirua 174.84,-41.131 d: 18822.9  

🇳🇿 Palmerston North 175.61,-40.357 d: 18753.9  

Bing Map

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