Rent Houses Crawley

West Sussex

Approximate Population: 99,744

Although Crawley itself is not mentioned in the Domesday Book of 1086, the nearby settlements of Ifield and Worth are recorded.  The first written record of Crawley dates from 1202, when a licence was issued by King John for a weekly market on Wednesdays.  Crawley grew slowly in importance over the next few centuries, but was boosted in the 18th century by the construction of the turnpike road between London and Brighton.   When this was completed in 1770, travel between the newly fashionable seaside resort and London became safer and quicker, and Crawley (located approximately halfway between the two) prospered as a coaching halt.

By 1839 it offered almost an hourly service to both destinations.  The George, a timber-framed house dating from the 15th century, expanded to become a large coaching inn, taking over adjacent buildings.  Eventually an annexe had to be built in the middle of the wide High Street; this survived until the 1930s.  The original building has become the George Hotel, with conference facilities and 84 bedrooms; it retains many period features including an iron fireback.

Crawley’s oldest church is St John the Baptist’s, between the High Street and the Broadway. It has 13th century origins, but there has been much rebuilding (especially in the 19th century) and the oldest part remaining is the south wall of the nave, which is believed to be 14th century.   The church has a 15th-century tower (rebuilt in 1804) which originally contained four bells cast in 1724.   Two were replaced by Thomas Lester of London in 1742; but in 1880 a new set of eight bells were cast and installed by the Croydon-based firm Gillett, Bland & Company.

The Coventry Canal terminates near the city centre at Coventry Canal Basin and is navigable for 61 km (38 miles) to Fradley Junction in Staffordshire.

Rent Houses Crawley West Sussex

Rent Houses Rochester Kent

Approximate Population: 27,000

Rochester City Council bought the land at Rochester Airfield in September 1933 from the landowner as the site for a municipal airport. One month later Short Brothers, who had started building aircraft in 1909 on the Isle of Sheppey, asked for permission to lease the land for test flying.
Rochester station building. The railway passes at first floor level on a viaduct.

In 1934-5 Short Brothers took over the Rochester Airport site when they moved some of their personnel from the existing seaplane works. The inaugural flight into Rochester was from Gravesend, John Parker flying their Short Scion G-ACJI.

In 1979 the lease reverted to the council. After giving thorough consideration to closing the airport, GEC (then comprising Marconi and instrument makers Elliot Automation) decided to take over management of the airport. It maintained two grass runways while releasing some land for light industrial expansion.

Rent Houses Rochester Kent

Rent Houses Darlington Durham

Approximate Population: 106,000

Darlington is a town in the ceremonial county of County Durham, England, and the main population centre in the Borough of Darlington. Darlington has a resident population of 97,838 as of 1997. On 1 April 1997, the Borough of Darlington became a unitary authority area, which separated it from the non-metropolitan county of Durham, for administrative purposes and is now part of the Tees Valley. The town is home to the football team Darlington F.C., known as The Quakers because of the contributions made to the town by men such as Edward and Joseph Pease, members of the Religious Society of Friends.

Darlington is Located within the Tees Valley and is often slated as ‘The gateway to the Tees Valley’. Although the tees valley is often known for its industry very little in the way of industry exists in Darlington.

Darlington is close to The Pennines and Cleveland Hills, the North York Moors are also with in easy reach of the town. Both the River Tees and River Skerne pass through the town, the River Skerne later joining the River Tees which then flows into the North Sea.

Darlington railway station (Bank Top) lies on the East Coast Main Line. There are also services from the historic North Road railway station and associated Darlington Railway Centre and Museum.

In 1870, The Northern Echo newspaper was launched. It is based in Priestgate and is a long-standing part of life in the North East. Although a local paper, it is a full-bodied newspaper in its own right and includes national and international news in its scope. Independent local radio station Alpha 103.2 launched in 1995. William Thomas Stead was the first editor of the Northern Echo – opposite of the Northern Echo building is the ‘The William Stead’ public house, restaurant and beer garden.

The town has the Queen Elizabeth Sixth Form College (former grammar school), which gets the best A level results in North East England. There are many other schools including: Hummersknott School, Carmel RC Technology College, Hurworth School and Longfield School. Darlington College is the newly built FE College. The town has other schools that have become Academies, this includes Eastbourne Comprehensive School, which has now become Eastbourne Church Of England Academy, soon to be St.Aidans Church Of England Academy.

Rent Houses Darlington Durham

Rent Houses Basildon Essex

Approximate Population: 99,876

The first historical reference to Basildon is in records from 1086.   It is mentioned in the Domesday Book as ‘Belesduna’.  The name ‘Basildon’ means ‘Beorhtel’s hill’ and is derived from the Anglo-Saxon personal name ‘Beorhtel’ and the Anglo-Saxon word ‘dun’, meaning hill.   In historical documents, this name had various forms over the centuries, including Berdlesdon, Batlesdon and Belesduna.

By the beginning of the 1900s, Basildon had evolved with much of the land having been sold in small plots during a period of land speculation and development taking placed haphazardly with building by plotowners ranging from shelters created from recycled materials to brick-built homes and with amenities such as water, gas, electricity and hard-surfaced roads lacking.

In the 1940s, Billericay and Essex County Councils, who were concerned about the lack of amenities on the area and how it had evolved, petitioned the Government to create a New Town, and on January 4 1949, Lewis Silkin, Minister of Town and Country Planning, officially designated Basildon as a ‘New Town’.   Basildon Development Corporation was formed in February 1949 to transform the designated area into a modern new town.   The New Town incorporated Laindon and Pitsea and was laid out around small neighbourhoods with the first house being completed in June 1951.  The first tenants moved into homes on 18 June 1951, in numbers 59, 61, and 63 Redgrave Road in Vange.

Rent Houses Basildon Essex

Rent Houses Southampton Hampshire

Approximate Population: 228,600

There are 120,305 jobs in Southampton, and 3,570 people claiming job seeker’s allowance, approximately 2.4 per cent of the city’s population, as of March 2007.  This compares with an average of 2.5 per cent for England as a whole. As of June 2006, 74.7 per cent of the city’s population are classed as economically active.

Just over a quarter of the jobs available in the city are in the health and education sector.   A further 19 per cent are property and other business and the third largest sector is wholesale and retail, which accounts for 16.2 percent.  Between 1995 and 2004, the number of jobs in Southampton has increased by 18.5 per cent. As of January 2007, the average annual salary in the city was £22,267.   This was £1,700 lower than the national average and £3,800 less than the average for the South East.

Southampton has always been a maritime centre, and the docks have long been a major employer in the city.   In particular, it is a port for cruise ships; its heyday was the first half of the 20th century, and in particular the inter-war years, when it handled almost half the passenger traffic of the UK. Today it remains home to luxury cruise ships, as well as being the largest freight port on the Channel coast and fourth largest UK port by tonnage, with several container terminals.

Unlike some other ports, such as Liverpool, London, and Bristol, where industry and docks have largely moved out of the city centres leaving room for redevelopment, Southampton retains much of its inner-city industry. Part of the docks has been redeveloped, however, as the Ocean Village development, a local marina and entertainment complex.   Southampton is home to the headquarters of both the Maritime and Coastguard Agency and the Marine Accident Investigation Branch of the Department for Transport.

Rent Houses Southampton Hampshire

Rent Houses

Stoke Staffordshire

Approximate Population: 457,165

An early proposal for a federation took place in 1888, when an amendment was raised to the Local Government Bill which would have made the six towns districts within a county of ‘Staffordshire Potteries’.   It was not until 1 April 1910 that the Six Towns were brought together.   The county borough of Hanley, the municipal boroughs of Burslem, Longton, and Stoke, together with the urban districts of Tunstall and Fenton now formed a single county borough of Stoke-on-Trent.  The combined borough took the name of town of Stoke.

The borough proposed in 1919 to expand further and annex the neighbouring borough of Newcastle-under-Lyme and the Wolstanton United Urban District, both to the west of Stoke: this met strong objections from Newcastle Corporation and never took place.   A further attempt was made in 1930, with the promotion of the Stoke-on-Trent Extension Bill.   Ultimately, Wolstanton was added to Newcastle-under-Lyme instead in 1932. Although attempts to take Newcastle, Wolstanton and Kidsgrove (north of Tunstall) were never successful, the borough did however expand in 1922, taking in Smallthorne Urban District, and parts of other parishes from Stoke upon Trent Rural District.   The borough was officially granted city status in 1925 with a Lord Mayor from 1928.

The city’s county borough status was abolished in 1974, and it became a non-metropolitan district of Staffordshire.   Its status was restored as a unitary authority with the local authority as Stoke-on-Trent City Council whilst remaining part of the ceremonial county of Staffordshire on 1 April 1997.

Rent Houses Stoke Staffordshire

Rent Houses Dartford Kent

Approximate Population: 85,911

Dartford is the principal town in the borough of Dartford. It is situated in the northwest corner of Kent, England, 16 miles (25 km) east south-east of central London.

The town centre is situated in a valley through which the River Darent flows, and where the old road from London to Dover crossed: hence the name, from Darent + ford. Dartford became a market town in medieval times and, although today it is principally a commuter town for Greater London, it has a long history of religious, industrial and cultural importance. It is an important rail hub; the main through-road now avoids the town itself.

Dartford lies within the area known as the London Basin. The low-lying marsh to the north of the town consists of London Clay, and the alluvium brought down by the two rivers – the Darent and the Cray – whose confluence is in this area. The higher land on which the town stands, and through which the narrow Darent valley runs, consists of chalk surmounted by the Blackheath Beds of sand and gravel.

As a human settlement, Dartford became established as a river crossing-point with the coming of the Romans; and as a focal point between two routes – that from west to east being part of the main route connecting London with the Continent; and the southerly route following the Darent valley. As a result the town’s main road pattern makes the shape of letter ‘T’. The Dartford Marshes to the north, and the proximity of Crayford in the London Borough of Bexley to the west, mean that the town’s growth is to the south and east. Wilmington is to all intents and purposes part of the town to the south; whilst the almost continuous Thames Gateway development means that there is little to show the town boundary in an easterly direction.

Rent Houses Dartford Kent

Rent Houses Dudley West Midlands

Approximate Population: 194,919

Dudley is a large town in the West Midlands, England, with a population of 194,919. Since 1974 it has been the administrative centre of the wider Metropolitan Borough of Dudley; the original County Borough had undergone a lesser expansion in 1966. It is the 19th largest settlement in England, measured by Urban Sub-Area, the second largest town in the United Kingdom, behind Reading and the largest settlement in the UK without its own university.

The town is home to Dudley Zoo, and the Black Country Living Museum. Visitors to the museum may also take a narrowboat trip from the adjacent canal, through the Dudley Tunnel. The ruined Dudley Castle is within the grounds of the zoo, and there is an extensive wooded ridge that runs north from the castle.

Dudley Zoo is to be regenerated under proposals by Dudley Zoo in partnership with Dudley Council, St Modwen and Advantage West Midlands, which will see a former freightliner site redeveloped with a tropical dome, Asiatic forest, two aquatic facilities and walkthrough aviaries. It is expected to cost £38.7 million.

Dudley is home to a former Odeon Cinema and a former music hall, the Dudley Hippodrome, both from the Art Deco period in the 1930s.   The Dudley Hippodrome was built on to the side of the now-demolished Opera House (built in 1900 and burnt down in 1936) and is now a bingo hall. There is a Showcase Cinema in a retail park between the zoo and museum.

Rent Houses Dudley West Midlands

Rent Houses Tunbridge Wells Kent

Approximate Population: 56,500

Royal Tunbridge Wells (usually shortened to Tunbridge Wells) is a town in west Kent, England, about 31 miles (50 km) south-southeast of central London, bordering the county of East Sussex. It is situated at the northern edge of the High Weald, the sandstone geology of which is exemplified by the rock formations at the Wellington Rocks and High Rocks.

The town came into being as a spa in Georgian times and had its heyday as a tourist resort under Richard (Beau) Nash when the Pantiles and its chalybeate spring attracted visitors who wished to take the waters. Though its popularity waned with the advent of sea bathing, the town remains popular and derives some 30% of its income from the tourist industry.

Borough and the UK parliamentary constituency of Tunbridge Wells. In the United Kingdom Tunbridge Wells has a reputation as being the archetypal “Middle England” town, a stereotype that is typified by the fictional letter-writer “Disgusted of Tunbridge Wells”.

There is evidence that during the Iron Age people farmed the fields and mined the iron-rich rocks in the Tunbridge Wells area, and excavations in 1940 and 1957–61 by James Money at High Rocks uncovered the remains of a defensive hill-fort. It is thought that the site was occupied into the era of Roman Britain, and the area continued to be part of the Wealden iron industry until its demise in the late eighteenth century – indeed, an iron forge remains in the grounds of Bayham Abbey, in use until 1575 and documented until 1714.

Rent Houses Tunbridge Wells Kent

Rent Houses Littlehampton West Sussex

Approximate Population: 25,593

Littlehampton is a seaside resort town and civil parish in the Arun District of West Sussex, England, located on the east bank at the mouth of the River Arun. It lies 51.5 miles (83 km) south southwest of London, 17.5 miles (28 km) west of Brighton, and 11 miles (18 km) east of the county town of Chichester.

The parish covers an area of 11.35 km2 (4 sq mi) and has a population of 25,593 persons (2001 census). The conurbation includes other settlements: Wick in the north west; Lyminster to the north; East Preston, Rustington and Angmering to the east. Wick and Toddington became part of the town in 1901. Nearby towns include Bognor Regis west southwest and Worthing to the east. The town is also the Westernmost settlement of the 12th largest urban area in the UK, the Brighton/Worthing/Littlehampton conurbation, a region encompassing some 461,181 people (2001 census).

The headquarters of The Body Shop is located in Littlehampton. Local company, Dando Drilling International Ltd has been exporting drilling rigs from Littlehampton since 1867. Van Heyningen Brothers (VHB) salad growers were a major employer in the town from 1964–2003. Much of the local economy comprises smaller companies with fewer than ten employees, however Sainsbury’s are in the town centre and the local authority is actively seeking to promote and expand business opportunities.

Littlehampton has received a great deal of publicity as the home of the East Beach Cafe, a building on the seafront designed by Heatherwick Studio.

The building is a fully welded monocoque structure. The building reflects its exposed location with a rough, weathered appearance which Heatherwick describes as being like a piece of weathered flotsam swept up onto the beach. It was built in Littlehampton, with steelwork by Littlehampton Welding Ltd and site work by Langridge Developments, another local firm. The construction of the cafe caused a stir in Littlehampton, with some seeing it as an eyesore and others welcoming it as a world class piece of architecture and a symbol of regeneration.

Rent Houses Littlehampton West Sussex