Bridgend, Wales, United Kingdom

🏴󠁧󠁢󠁷󠁬󠁳󠁿 Bridgend is a town in Bridgend County Borough in Wales. The river crossed by the original bridge, which gave the town its name, is the River Ogmore, but the River Ewenny also passes to the south of the town.

Historically a part of Glamorgan, Bridgend has greatly expanded in size since the early 1980s. The town is undergoing a redevelopment project, with the town centre mainly pedestrianised and ongoing works including Brackla Street Centre redevelopment to Bridgend Shopping Centre, Rhiw Car Park redevelopment, ongoing public realm improvements and the upgrade of the Bridgend Life Centre and demolition of Sunnyside offices to accommodate a large retirement complex.

Economy Bridgend's travel to work area has expanded since 1991 and the 2001-based area now incorporates the western part of the Vale of Glamorgan.

Bridgend recovered quickly from the decline of traditional industries, particularly coal-mining due to other alternative forms of employment. Wages are generally higher here than in other parts of the South Wales valleys. There are large industrial estates at Bridgend and Waterton (formerly Waterton Admiralty) which host a number of small-scale and multi-national companies, mainly manufacturing.

Ford's engine plant near Waterton used to employ around 2,000 workers and was one of the area's largest employers, working on range of low carbon "EcoBoost" engines. The plant won praise from Peter Mandelson in January 2009 who described it as "a top-of-the-class, world-beating engine production plant". Ford invested £315million in the Bridgend plant between 2004 and 2009. The Ford plant closed in September 2020.

IT Consultancy Group CGI have an office in Bridgend, and Lidl has also set up its Welsh headquarters and distribution site at Waterton. Zoobiotic, a company specialising in maggot therapy, has its facility near Bridgend town centre. Also, since 1983, famous dart board producer Winmau has based its global headquarters in Bridgend.

Others include Ortho-Clinical Diagnostics, Staedtler, engineering consultancy Skanska, aeronautic maintenance and project management company TES Aviation and home accessories manufacturer Dekor plc. The Semiconductor Photomask Company, Photronics Inc, has had a manufacturing operation for the last 20 years at the Ewenny Science Park.

However, there have been significant economic blows to Bridgend including Sony's closure of the Bridgend plant and downsizing of the Pencoed plant. The plant is still Sony's biggest in the UK despite this. Other manufacturers to have pulled out of the area include Wrigley Company and Dairy Farmers of Britain which went into receivership in June 2009.

Bridgend has a lack of high-wage service jobs; however the retail sector in particular provides a large proportion of employment in the town and borough. In 2008, there were 13,100 people in Bridgend County working in construction and manufacturing, while 42,900 were working in the service sector. Sub-regional GVA for the Bridgend & Neath Port Talbot NUTS3 region stood at £12,402 per capita in 2006 ($23,191 at June 2006 values). This figure represents 65% of the UK GVA per capita, 87% of Welsh GVA per capita (£14,226) and 103% of West Wales & The Valleys GVA per capita (£12,071). Gross disposable income for Bridgend & Neath Port Talbot in 2006 stood at £3,338 million or £12,379 per head. This was 88% of UK per head figure (£14,053) and slightly above the Welsh per head figure (£12,366).

In 2008, the average full-time gross weekly earnings in Swansea, Bridgend & Neath Port Talbot was £484.20 (£531.70 for men, £426.10 for women). This was 97% of the Welsh average (£498.10). In the first half of 2009, unemployment in Bridgend County Borough stood at 8.9% and economic inactivity stood at 21.4%.

The percentage of workless households in December 2008 stood at 20.6% compared to the UK average of 16% and the Welsh average of 18.8%.

Retail In the town centre the main retail shopping areas are the Rhiw Shopping Centre (containing Bridgend Market), Adare Street, Caroline Street, Derwen Road, Nolton Street, Queen Street, Dunraven Place, Market Street and Cheapside (home of the Brackla Street Centre and Asda store). These are near the bus and railway stations and pay and display car parks.

There are out-of-town shopping areas at Waterton, near the A473, on Cowbridge Road and at The Derwen, Junction 36 of the M4, home to the Bridgend Designer Outlet.

Transport Bridgend railway station has regular services to Cardiff Central, Bristol Parkway and London Paddington to the east; Port Talbot Parkway, Neath, Swansea and the West Wales Line to the west; and Maesteg to the north. There are also services to Manchester Piccadilly. Bridgend is the western terminus of the Vale of Glamorgan Line which reopened to passenger traffic in 2005.

Wildmill railway station, about 1 mile (2 km) north of Bridgend railway station, serves the estates of Wildmill, Pendre and Litchard and is on the Bridgend-Maesteg branch line. A park and ride station at Brackla, about 1.5 miles (2.4 km) south-east of Bridgend railway station is planned and is due to be constructed once capacity improvements have been made to the South Wales Main Line. Services to a new railway station in Llanharan began in December 2007.

Bridgend bus station has services to urban and rural areas in South Wales. Most services are operated by First Cymru under the "Bridgend & County" livery.

An east–west cycle route has been constructed from Brackla through to Broadlands and into Cefn Glas. Bridgend is on the National Cycle Route and there are off-road spurs from the Celtic Trail to the town centre and a community route in the Ogmore Valley. Glyncorrwg and the Afan Valley about 12 miles (19 km) north of Bridgend near Maesteg is famed for its mountain bike trails, considered[who?] amongst the best in Europe.

For scheduled and chartered air travel, Bridgend is served by Cardiff International Airport, to which there are direct rail and bus services.