Crawley () is a large town and
borough
A borough is an administrative division in various English-speaking countries. In principle, the term ''borough'' designates a self-governing walled town, although in practice, official use of the term varies widely.
History
In the Middle A ...
in
West Sussex
West Sussex is a county in South East England on the English Channel coast. The ceremonial county comprises the shire districts of Adur, Arun, Chichester, Horsham, and Mid Sussex, and the boroughs of Crawley and Worthing. Covering an ...
,
England
England is a country that is part of the United Kingdom. It shares land borders with Wales to its west and Scotland to its north. The Irish Sea lies northwest and the Celtic Sea to the southwest. It is separated from continental Europe b ...
. It is south of
London
London is the capital and largest city of England and the United Kingdom, with a population of just under 9 million. It stands on the River Thames in south-east England at the head of a estuary down to the North Sea, and has been a majo ...
, north of
Brighton and Hove
Brighton and Hove () is a city and unitary authority in East Sussex, England. It consists primarily of the settlements of Brighton and Hove, alongside neighbouring villages.
Often referred to synonymously as Brighton, the City of Brighton and H ...
, and north-east of the county town of
Chichester
Chichester () is a cathedral city and civil parish in West Sussex, England.OS Explorer map 120: Chichester, South Harting and Selsey Scale: 1:25 000. Publisher:Ordnance Survey – Southampton B2 edition. Publishing Date:2009. It is the only ci ...
. Crawley covers an area of and had a population of 106,597 at the time of the
2011 Census.
The area has been inhabited since
the Stone Age,
and was a centre of
ironwork
Ironwork is any weapon, artwork, utensil, or architectural feature made of iron, especially one used for decoration. There are two main types of ironwork: wrought iron and cast iron. While the use of iron dates as far back as 4000BC, it was the ...
ing in
Roman
Roman or Romans most often refers to:
*Rome, the capital city of Italy
*Ancient Rome, Roman civilization from 8th century BC to 5th century AD
*Roman people, the people of ancient Rome
*''Epistle to the Romans'', shortened to ''Romans'', a letter ...
times. Crawley developed slowly as a
market town
A market town is a settlement most common in Europe that obtained by custom or royal charter, in the Middle Ages, a market right, which allowed it to host a regular market; this distinguished it from a village or city. In Britain, small rural ...
from the 13th century, serving the surrounding villages in the
Weald
The Weald () is an area of South East England between the parallel chalk escarpments of the North and the South Downs. It crosses the counties of Hampshire, Surrey, Sussex and Kent. It has three separate parts: the sandstone "High Weald" in the ...
. Its location on the main road from London to Brighton brought passing trade, which encouraged the development of
coaching inns. A rail link to London opened in 1841.
Gatwick Airport
Gatwick Airport (), also known as London Gatwick , is a major international airport near Crawley, West Sussex, England, south of Central London. In 2021, Gatwick was the third-busiest airport by total passenger traffic in the UK, after H ...
, nowadays one of Britain's busiest international airports, opened on the edge of the town in the 1940s, encouraging commercial and industrial growth. After the Second World War, the British Government planned to move large numbers of people and jobs out of London and into
new towns
A planned community, planned city, planned town, or planned settlement is any community that was carefully planned from its inception and is typically constructed on previously undeveloped land. This contrasts with settlements that evolve ...
around South East England. The
New Towns Act 1946
The New Towns Acts were a series of Acts of the Parliament of the United Kingdom to found new settlements or to expand substantially existing ones, to establish Development Corporations to deliver them, and to create a Commission to wind up the ...
designated Crawley as the site of one of these.
A master plan was developed for the establishment of new residential, commercial, industrial and civic areas, and rapid development greatly increased the size and population of the town over a few decades.
The town contains 14 residential neighbourhoods radiating out from the core of the old market town, and separated by main roads and railway lines. The nearby communities of
Ifield,
Pound Hill
Pound Hill is one of 14 neighbourhoods within the town of Crawley in West Sussex, England. Pound Hill is located on the east of Crawley. It is bordered by Three Bridges and Manor Royal to the west and Maidenbower to the south.
It is the larg ...
and
Three Bridges were absorbed into the new town at various stages in its development. In 2009, expansion was being planned in the west and north-west of the town, in cooperation with
Horsham District Council
Horsham is a market town on the upper reaches of the River Arun on the fringe of the Weald in West Sussex, England. The town is south south-west of London, north-west of Brighton and north-east of the county town of Chichester. Nearby town ...
, which has now become a new neighbourhood named
Kilnwood Vale
Kilnwood Vale is a village in the Horsham district of West Sussex, England. It borders the High Weald Area of Outstanding Natural Beauty along the A264 east of Faygate between Horsham and Crawley. The development first opened in 2016 which w ...
, but it is not in Crawley.
Economically, the town has developed into the main centre of industry and employment between London and the south coast. Its large industrial area supports manufacturing and service companies, many of them connected with the airport. The commercial and retail sectors continue to expand.
History
Origins
The area may have been settled during the
Mesolithic
The Mesolithic (Greek: μέσος, ''mesos'' 'middle' + λίθος, ''lithos'' 'stone') or Middle Stone Age is the Old World archaeological period between the Upper Paleolithic and the Neolithic. The term Epipaleolithic is often used synonymous ...
period: locally manufactured
flint
Flint, occasionally flintstone, is a sedimentary cryptocrystalline form of the mineral quartz, categorized as the variety of chert that occurs in chalk or marly limestone. Flint was widely used historically to make stone tools and start fir ...
s of the Horsham Culture type have been found to the southwest of the town.
Tools and
burial mound
Burial, also known as interment or inhumation, is a method of final disposition whereby a dead body is placed into the ground, sometimes with objects. This is usually accomplished by excavating a pit or trench, placing the deceased and objec ...
s from the
Neolithic period
The Neolithic period, or New Stone Age, is an Old World archaeological period and the final division of the Stone Age. It saw the Neolithic Revolution, a wide-ranging set of developments that appear to have arisen independently in several parts ...
, and burial mounds and a sword from the
Bronze Age
The Bronze Age is a historic period, lasting approximately from 3300 BC to 1200 BC, characterized by the use of bronze, the presence of writing in some areas, and other early features of urban civilization. The Bronze Age is the second pri ...
, have also been discovered.
Crawley is on the western edge of the
High Weald, which produced iron for more than 2,000 years from the
Iron Age
The Iron Age is the final epoch of the three-age division of the prehistory and protohistory of humanity. It was preceded by the Stone Age (Paleolithic, Mesolithic, Neolithic) and the Bronze Age (Chalcolithic). The concept has been mostly appl ...
onwards.
Goffs Park—now a recreational area in the south of the town—was the site of two late Iron Age furnaces.
Ironworking and mineral extraction continued throughout
Roman times
In modern historiography, ancient Rome refers to Roman civilisation from the founding of the city of Rome in the 8th century BC to the collapse of the Western Roman Empire in the 5th century AD. It encompasses the Roman Kingdom (753–509 BC ...
, particularly in the Broadfield area where many furnaces were built.
![St John the Baptist's Church, Crawley (October 2011)](https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/c/cc/St_John_the_Baptist%27s_Church%2C_Crawley_%28October_2011%29.JPG)
In the 5th century,
Saxon settlers named the area Crow's Leah—meaning a crow-infested clearing, or Crow's Wood.
This name evolved over time, and the present spelling appeared by the early 14th century.
By this time, nearby settlements were more established: the Saxon church at
Worth, for example, dates from between 950 and 1050 AD.
Although Crawley itself is not mentioned in the
Domesday Book
Domesday Book () – the Middle English spelling of "Doomsday Book" – is a manuscript record of the "Great Survey" of much of England and parts of Wales completed in 1086 by order of King William I, known as William the Conqueror. The manusc ...
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
John is a common English name and surname:
* John (given name)
* John (surname)
John may also refer to:
New Testament
Works
* Gospel of John, a title often shortened to John
* First Epistle of John, often shortened to 1 John
* Secon ...
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
Turnpike often refers to:
* A type of gate, another word for a turnstile
* In the United States, a toll road
Turnpike may also refer to:
Roads United Kingdom
* A turnpike road, a principal road maintained by a turnpike trust, a body with powers ...
road between London and
Brighton
Brighton () is a seaside resort and one of the two main areas of the City of Brighton and Hove in the county of East Sussex, England. It is located south of London.
Archaeological evidence of settlement in the area dates back to the Bronze A ...
. 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
Timber framing (german: Holzfachwerk) and "post-and-beam" construction are traditional methods of building with heavy timbers, creating structures using squared-off and carefully fitted and joined timbers with joints secured by large woode ...
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 is said to have 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
The nave () is the central part of a church, stretching from the (normally western) main entrance or rear wall, to the transepts, or in a church without transepts, to the chancel. When a church contains side aisles, as in a basilica-type ...
, which is believed to be 14th century. The church has a 15th-century
tower
A tower is a tall Nonbuilding structure, structure, taller than it is wide, often by a significant factor. Towers are distinguished from guyed mast, masts by their lack of guy-wires and are therefore, along with tall buildings, self-supporting ...
(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.
Railway age and Victorian era
![Crawley-signalbox-2008](https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/a/a8/Crawley-signalbox-2008.JPG)
The
Brighton Main Line
The Brighton Main Line (also known as the South Central Main Line) is a major railway line in the United Kingdom that links Brighton, on the south coast of England, with central London. In London the line has two branches, out of and station ...
was the first railway line to serve the Crawley area. A station was opened at
Three Bridges (originally known as East Crawley)
in the summer of 1841.
Crawley railway station
Crawley railway station is a railway station serving the town of Crawley in West Sussex, England. It is down the line from , measured via Redhill. It is operated by Southern. The station is the last stop on the Arun Valley Line before it join ...
, at the southern end of the High Street, was built in 1848 when the
Horsham branch was opened from Three Bridges to Horsham. A line was built eastwards from
Three Bridges to East Grinstead in 1855. Three Bridges had become the hub of transport in the area by this stage: one-quarter of its population was employed in railway jobs by 1861 (mainly at the
London, Brighton and South Coast Railway
The London, Brighton and South Coast Railway (LB&SCR; known also as the Brighton line, the Brighton Railway or the Brighton) was a railway company in the United Kingdom from 1846 to 1922. Its territory formed a rough triangle, with London at its ...
's railway works near the station).
The Longley company—one of South East England's largest building firms in the late 19th century, responsible for buildings including
Christ's Hospital
Christ's Hospital is a public school (English independent boarding school for pupils aged 11–18) with a royal charter located to the south of Horsham in West Sussex. The school was founded in 1552 and received its first royal charter in 1553. ...
school and King Edward VII
Sanatorium
A sanatorium (from Latin '' sānāre'' 'to heal, make healthy'), also sanitarium or sanitorium, are antiquated names for specialised hospitals, for the treatment of specific diseases, related ailments and convalescence. Sanatoriums are often ...
in
Midhurst
Midhurst () is a market town, parish and civil parish in West Sussex, England. It lies on the River Rother inland from the English Channel, and north of the county town of Chichester.
The name Midhurst was first recorded in 1186 as ''Middeh ...
—moved to a site next to Crawley station in 1881.
In 1898 more than 700 people were employed at the site.
There was a major expansion in house building in the late 19th century. An area known as "New Town" (unrelated to the postwar developments) was created around the railway
level crossing
A level crossing is an intersection where a railway line crosses a road, Trail, path, or (in rare situations) airport runway, at the same level, as opposed to the railway line crossing over or under using an Overpass#Railway, overpass ...
and down the Brighton Road;
the
West Green area, west of the High Street on the way to Ifield, was built up; and housing spread south of the Horsham line for the first time, into what is now
Southgate
Southgate or South Gate may refer to:
Places Australia
*Southgate, Sylvania
*Southgate Arts and Leisure Precinct, an area within Southbank, Victoria
Canada
*Southgate, Ontario, a township in Grey County
* Southgate, Middlesex County, Ontario
Ed ...
. The population reached 4,433 in 1901, compared to 1,357 a century earlier.
In 1891, a racecourse was opened on farmland at Gatwick. Built to replace a
steeplechase course at
Waddon
Waddon () is a neighbourhood in the London Borough of Croydon, at the western end of the town of Croydon. The area borders the London Borough of Sutton.
History
It is not known when the manor of Croydon was granted to the See of Canterbury, b ...
near
Croydon
Croydon is a large town in south London, England, south of Charing Cross. Part of the London Borough of Croydon, a local government district of Greater London. It is one of the largest commercial districts in Greater London, with an extensi ...
in Surrey, it was used for both steeplechase and
flat racing
Horse racing is an equestrian performance sport, typically involving two or more horses ridden by jockeys (or sometimes driven without riders) over a set distance for competition. It is one of the most ancient of all sports, as its basic p ...
, and held the
Grand National
The Grand National is a National Hunt horse race held annually at Aintree Racecourse in Liverpool, England. First run in 1839, it is a handicap ...
during the years of the First World War.
The course had its own railway station on the Brighton Main Line.
In the early 20th century, many of the large
country estates in the area, with their
mansion
A mansion is a large dwelling house. The word itself derives through Old French from the Latin word ''mansio'' "dwelling", an abstract noun derived from the verb ''manere'' "to dwell". The English word '' manse'' originally defined a property l ...
s and associated grounds and outbuildings, were split up into smaller plots of land, attracting haphazard housing development and small farms.
By the outbreak of the First World War in 1914 Crawley had grown into a small but prosperous town, serving a wide rural area and those passing through on the
A23 London–Brighton road. Three-quarters of the population had piped water supplies, all businesses and homes had electricity, and piped gas and street lighting had been in place for 50 years.
An airfield was opened in 1930 on land near the racecourse. This was a private concern until the Second World War when it was claimed by the
Royal Air Force
The Royal Air Force (RAF) is the United Kingdom's air and space force. It was formed towards the end of the First World War on 1 April 1918, becoming the first independent air force in the world, by regrouping the Royal Flying Corps (RFC) and ...
.
New Town
In May 1946, the New Towns Act of 1946 identified Crawley as a suitable location for a
New Town;
but it was not officially designated as such until .
The of land set aside for the new town were split across the county borders between
East Sussex, West Sussex and
Surrey
Surrey () is a ceremonial and non-metropolitan county in South East England, bordering Greater London to the south west. Surrey has a large rural area, and several significant urban areas which form part of the Greater London Built-up Area. ...
. Architect
Thomas Bennett was appointed chairman of
Crawley Development Corporation
Crawley Development Corporation was set up in February 1947 by the Government of the United Kingdom to establish, administer and control the development of the New Town of Crawley in accordance with the New Towns Act 1946. The Corporation had t ...
. A court challenge to the designation order meant that plans were not officially confirmed until December 1947. By this time, an initial plan for the development of the area had been drawn up by
Anthony Minoprio.
This proposed filling in the gaps between the villages of Crawley, Ifield and Three Bridges.
Bennett estimated that planning, designing and building the town, and increasing its population from the existing 9,500 to 40,000, would take 15 years.
Work began almost immediately to prepare for the expansion of the town. A full master plan was in place by 1949. This envisaged an increase in the population of the town to 50,000, residential properties in nine neighbourhoods radiating from the town centre, and a separate industrial area to the north.
The neighbourhoods would consist mainly of three-bedroom family homes, with a number of smaller and larger properties. Each would be built around a centre with shops, a church, a
public house
A pub (short for public house) is a kind of drinking establishment which is licensed to serve alcoholic drinks for consumption on the premises. The term ''public house'' first appeared in the United Kingdom in late 17th century, and was ...
, a primary school and a
community centre
Community centres, community centers, or community halls are public locations where members of a community tend to gather for group activities, social support, public information, and other purposes. They may sometimes be open for the whole co ...
.
Secondary education was to be provided at campuses at Ifield Green, Three Bridges and
Tilgate
Tilgate is one of 14 neighbourhoods within the town of Crawley in West Sussex, England. The area contains a mixture of privately developed housing, self-build groups and ex-council housing. It is bordered by the districts of Furnace Green to the ...
.
Later, a fourth campus, in Southgate, was added to the plans.
At first, little development took place in the town centre, and residents relied on the shops and services in the existing high street. The earliest progress was in
West Green, where new residents moved in during the late 1940s. In 1950 the town was visited by the then heir to the throne,
Princess Elizabeth, when she officially opened the
Manor Royal
Manor Royal is an industrial zone within the town of Crawley in West Sussex, England. Manor Royal is in the north of the town near to Gatwick Airport. The area is devoted to light industry and offices and was designed for industry as part of t ...
industrial area. Building work continued throughout the 1950s in West Green,
Northgate and Three Bridges, and later in
Langley Green,
Pound Hill
Pound Hill is one of 14 neighbourhoods within the town of Crawley in West Sussex, England. Pound Hill is located on the east of Crawley. It is bordered by Three Bridges and Manor Royal to the west and Maidenbower to the south.
It is the larg ...
and Ifield. In 1956, land at "Tilgate East" was allocated for housing use, eventually becoming the new neighbourhood of
Furnace Green
Furnace Green is one of 14 neighbourhoods in Crawley in West Sussex, England, and a local government ward. Furnace Green is located to the east of the town centre. It is bordered by Tilgate to the south west, Three Bridges to the north and Maide ...
.
Expectations of the eventual population of the town were revised upwards several times. The 1949 master plan had allowed for 50,000 people, but this was amended to 55,000 in 1956 after the Development Corporation had successfully resisted pressure from the Minister for Town and Country Planning to accommodate 60,000. Nevertheless, plans dated 1961 anticipated growth to 70,000 by 1980, and by 1969 consideration was given to an eventual expansion of up to 120,000.
![Crawley](https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/2/2a/Crawley.JPG)
Extended shopping facilities to the east of the existing high street were provided. The first stage to open was The Broadwalk in 1954, following by the opening of the Queen's Square development by
Her Majesty The Queen in 1958. Crawley railway station was moved eastwards towards the new development.
![St Mary's Church, Southgate, Crawley (Jan 2013)](https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/c/cd/St_Mary%27s_Church%2C_Southgate%2C_Crawley_%28Jan_2013%29.JPG)
By April 1960, when Thomas Bennett made his last presentation as chairman of the Development Corporation, the town's population had reached 51,700; of the factory and other industrial space had been provided; 21,800 people were employed, nearly 60% of whom worked in manufacturing industries, and only seventy people were registered as unemployed. The corporation had built 10,254 houses, and private builders provided around 1,500 more. Tenants were by then permitted to buy their houses and 440 householders had chosen to do so by April 1960.
A new plan was put forward by West Sussex County Council in 1961. This proposed new neighbourhoods at
Broadfield and
Bewbush
Bewbush is one of 14 neighbourhoods in Crawley in West Sussex, England. Bewbush is located in south west Crawley and is bordered by Broadfield to the south, Ifield to the north, Kilnwood Vale to the west and Gossops Green to the north east. ...
, both of which extended outside the administrative area of the then Urban District Council. Detailed plans were made for Broadfield in the late 1960s; by the early 1970s building work had begun. Further expansion at Bewbush was begun in 1974, although development there was slow. The two neighbourhoods were both larger than the original nine: together, their proposed population was 23,000. Work also took place in the area now known as Ifield West on the western fringes of the town.
By 1980, the council identified land at
Maidenbower
Maidenbower is one of 14 neighbourhoods within the town of Crawley in West Sussex, England. Maidenbower is located in the south east corner of the town, bordering the M23 motorway. It is bordered by Pound Hill to the north and Furnace Green to th ...
, south of the Pound Hill neighbourhood, as being suitable for another new neighbourhood, and work began in 1986. However, all of this development was undertaken privately, unlike the earlier neighbourhoods in which most of the housing was owned by the council.
In 1999, plans were announced to develop the 14th neighbourhood on land at
Tinsley Green
Tinsley Green is an area in the Borough of Crawley, one of seven local government districts in the English county of West Sussex. Originally a hamlet in the parish of Worth, it was absorbed by the New Town of Crawley in the 1940s and became ...
to the northeast of the town; this was given the go ahead in 2011 and is officially the town's 14th neighbourhood, named Forge Wood after the
ancient woodland
In the United Kingdom, an ancient woodland is a woodland that has existed continuously since 1600 or before in England, Wales and Northern Ireland (or 1750 in Scotland). Planting of woodland was uncommon before those dates, so a wood present in 16 ...
that is enclosed within the development. After a temporary halt to the proposals when a possible expansion at Gatwick Airport was announced,
construction started in 2015. Forge Wood is to have a maximum of 1900 homes. Development of another neighbourhood began in 2012 on the western side of Crawley in the
Horsham district
Horsham is a local government district in West Sussex, England. Its council is based in Horsham. The district borders those of Crawley, Mid Sussex, Mole Valley, Chichester, Arun and Adur, and the unitary authority of Brighton & Hove.
The ...
, named
Kilnwood Vale
Kilnwood Vale is a village in the Horsham district of West Sussex, England. It borders the High Weald Area of Outstanding Natural Beauty along the A264 east of Faygate between Horsham and Crawley. The development first opened in 2016 which w ...
. A plan for a new railway station fell through.
Governance
Local government
![Crawley1932OS](https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/d/de/Crawley1932OS.png)
Crawley became a parish in the sixteenth century, having previously been a chapelry in the parish of
Slaugham
Slaugham () is a village and civil parish in the Mid Sussex District of West Sussex, England. It is located to the south of Crawley, on the A23 road to Brighton. The civil parish covers an area of . At the 2001 census it had a population of 2,226 ...
. When district and parish councils were established under the
Local Government Act 1894
The Local Government Act 1894 (56 & 57 Vict. c. 73) was an Act of the Parliament of the United Kingdom that reformed local government in England and Wales outside the County of London. The Act followed the reforms carried out at county level un ...
, Crawley was given a parish council and included in the
Horsham Rural District
Rural districts were a type of local government area – now superseded – established at the end of the 19th century in England, Wales, and Ireland for the administration of predominantly rural areas at a level lower than that of the Ad ...
. The parish was significantly enlarged in 1933, when it absorbed the neighbouring parish of
Ifield.
Following the designation as a New Town in 1947, the parish of Crawley was enlarged in 1953 to take in territory from the parishes of Slaugham and
Worth. Three years later, on 1 April 1956, the parish of Crawley was made an
urban district
Urban district may refer to:
* District
* Urban area
* Quarter (urban subdivision)
* Neighbourhood
Specific subdivisions in some countries:
* Urban districts of Denmark
* Urban districts of Germany
* Urban district (Great Britain and Ireland) (hist ...
, making it independent from Horsham Rural District.
The
Local Government Act 1972
The Local Government Act 1972 (c. 70) is an Act of the Parliament of the United Kingdom that reformed local government in England and Wales on 1 April 1974. It was one of the most significant Acts of Parliament to be passed by the Heath Gov ...
led to the district being reformed as a borough in April 1974,
gaining a mayor for the first time.
The new borough in 1974 also saw its boundaries enlarged, gaining other areas which had been included in the designated area of the New Town as well as the area north of the town including
Gatwick Airport
Gatwick Airport (), also known as London Gatwick , is a major international airport near Crawley, West Sussex, England, south of Central London. In 2021, Gatwick was the third-busiest airport by total passenger traffic in the UK, after H ...
, which had previously been in
Surrey
Surrey () is a ceremonial and non-metropolitan county in South East England, bordering Greater London to the south west. Surrey has a large rural area, and several significant urban areas which form part of the Greater London Built-up Area. ...
.
The Urban District Council received its
coat of arms
A coat of arms is a heraldry, heraldic communication design, visual design on an escutcheon (heraldry), escutcheon (i.e., shield), surcoat, or tabard (the latter two being outer garments). The coat of arms on an escutcheon forms the central ele ...
from the
College of Heralds
The College of Arms, or Heralds' College, is a royal corporation consisting of professional officers of arms, with jurisdiction over England, Wales, Northern Ireland and some Commonwealth realms. The heralds are appointed by the British Sovere ...
in 1957. After the change to borough status a modified coat of arms, based on the original, was awarded in 1976 and presented to the council on 24 March 1977. It features a central cross on a shield, representing the town's location at the meeting point of North-South and East-West roads. The shield bears nine
martlet
A martlet in English heraldry is a mythical bird without feet that never roosts from the moment of its drop-birth until its death fall; martlets are proposed to be continuously on the wing. It is a compelling allegory for continuous effort, expre ...
s representing both the county of
Sussex
Sussex (), from the Old English (), is a historic county in South East England that was formerly an independent medieval Anglo-Saxon kingdom. It is bounded to the west by Hampshire, north by Surrey, northeast by Kent, south by the English ...
and the new town's original nine neighbourhoods. Supporters, of an eagle and a winged lion, relate to the significance of the airport to the locality. The motto featured is ''I Grow and I Rejoice''—a translation of a phrase from the ''Epistulae'' of
Seneca the Younger
Lucius Annaeus Seneca the Younger (; 65 AD), usually known mononymously as Seneca, was a Stoic philosopher of Ancient Rome, a statesman, dramatist, and, in one work, satirist, from the post-Augustan age of Latin literature.
Seneca was born in ...
.
Despite a petition to save it, the old Crawley Town Hall, which was built in the 1960s, was demolished in 2020 and a new
Crawley Town Hall is due to be completed in late 2022.
Initially, the district (and then borough) council worked with the
Commission for New Towns
English Partnerships (EP) was the national regeneration agency for England, performing a similar role on a national level to that fulfilled by regional development agencies on a regional level. On 1 December 2008 its powers passed to a successor ...
on many aspects of development; but in 1978 many of the commission's assets, such as housing and parks, were surrendered to the council. The authority's boundaries were extended in 1983 to accommodate the Bewbush and Broadfield neighbourhoods.
The borough remains part of the local two-tier arrangements, with services shared with
West Sussex County Council
West Sussex County Council (WSCC) is the authority that governs the non-metropolitan county of West Sussex. The county also contains seven district and borough councils, and 158 town, parish and neighbourhood councils. The county council has 7 ...
. The authority is divided into 13 wards, each of which is represented by two or three local councillors, forming a total council of 36 members. Most wards are coterminous with the borough's neighbourhoods, but three neighbourhoods are divided: Broadfield, Northgate, and Pound Hill into "Pound Hill North and Forge Wood" and "Pound Hill South and Worth". The council is elected in thirds.
As of the
2021 local elections, the council is run by
Labour
Labour or labor may refer to:
* Childbirth, the delivery of a baby
* Labour (human activity), or work
** Manual labour, physical work
** Wage labour, a socioeconomic relationship between a worker and an employer
** Organized labour and the labour ...
in coalition with the sole independent councillor, with seats held as follows:
United Kingdom government
Crawley Borough is coterminous with the
parliamentary constituency of Crawley.
Henry Smith won the seat at the
2010 general election and was re-elected at the 2015, 2017 and 2019 general elections.
Laura Moffatt
Laura Jean Moffatt (''née'' Field; born 9 April 1954) is a British Labour Party politician who was the Member of Parliament (MP) for Crawley from 1997 until 2010.
Early life
Born Laura Jean Field in London in 1954, she was educated at Hazelw ...
, a member of the
Labour Party, was the MP for Crawley from 1997 to 2010; she was the
Parliamentary Private Secretary
A Parliamentary Private Secretary (PPS) is a Member of Parliament (MP) in the United Kingdom who acts as an unpaid assistant to a minister or shadow minister. They are selected from backbench MPs as the 'eyes and ears' of the minister in the H ...
to the
Secretary of State for Health
The secretary of state for health and social care, also referred to as the health secretary, is a secretary of state in the Government of the United Kingdom, responsible for the work of the Department of Health and Social Care. The incumbent ...
,
Alan Johnson
Alan Arthur Johnson (born 17 May 1950) is a British politician who served as Secretary of State for Education and Skills from 2006 to 2007, Secretary of State for Health from 2007 to 2009, Home Secretary from 2009 to 2010, and Shadow Chanc ...
.
In the
2005 general election, the winning margin was the slimmest of any UK constituency: Moffatt won by just 37 votes.
Brook House and
Tinsley House Tinsley House may refer to:
*Tinsley House Immigration Removal Centre
Tinsley House is a United Kingdom Immigration Removal Centre (IRC), where individuals are held while awaiting decisions on their asylum claim or considered for deportation fro ...
Immigration Removal Centre
Immigration detention is the policy of holding individuals suspected of visa violations, illegal entry or unauthorized arrival, as well as those subject to deportation and removal until a decision is made by immigration authorities to grant a vi ...
s, operated by
UK Visas and Immigration
UK Visas and Immigration (UKVI) is a division of the Home Office responsible for the United Kingdom's visa system. It was formed in 2013 from the section of the UK Border Agency that had administered the visa system.
History
The then Home Secre ...
, are within the grounds of Gatwick Airport in Crawley.
Data from the
Home Office's national identity database at
Doncaster
Doncaster (, ) is a city in South Yorkshire, England. Named after the River Don, it is the administrative centre of the larger City of Doncaster. It is the second largest settlement in South Yorkshire after Sheffield. Doncaster is situated in ...
, South Yorkshire, was backed up to servers in Crawley for
disaster recovery and
business continuity
Business continuity may be defined as "the capability of an organization to continue the delivery of products or services at pre-defined acceptable levels following a disruptive incident", and business continuity planning (or business continuity a ...
purposes. The
Identity Documents Bill 2010
The Identity Documents Act 2010 (c. 40) is an Act of Parliament in the United Kingdom which reverses the introduction of identity cards, and requires the destruction of the information held on the National Identity Register.
As a bill, it was pr ...
, proposed in May 2010 and passed in September 2010, authorised the destruction of all data stored for the identity card scheme brought about by the
Identity Cards Act 2006
The Identity Cards Act 2006 (c. 15) was an Act of the Parliament of the United Kingdom that was repealed in 2011. It created national identity cards, a personal identification document and European Economic Area travel document, linked to a ...
.
Geography
At (51.1092, −0.1872), Crawley is in the northeastern corner of West Sussex in
South East England
South East England is one of the nine official regions of England at the ITL 1 statistical regions of England, first level of International Territorial Level, ITL for Statistics, statistical purposes. It consists of the counties of england, ...
, south of London and north of
Brighton and Hove
Brighton and Hove () is a city and unitary authority in East Sussex, England. It consists primarily of the settlements of Brighton and Hove, alongside neighbouring villages.
Often referred to synonymously as Brighton, the City of Brighton and H ...
. It is surrounded by towns including
Horley
Horley is a town in the borough of Reigate and Banstead in Surrey, England, south of the towns of Reigate and Redhill. The county border with West Sussex is to the south with Crawley and Gatwick Airport close to the town.
It has its own eco ...
,
Redhill,
Reigate
Reigate ( ) is a town status in the United Kingdom, town in Surrey, England, around south of central London. The settlement is recorded in Domesday Book in 1086 as ''Cherchefelle'' and first appears with its modern name in the 1190s. The earlie ...
,
Oxted
Oxted is a town and civil parish in the Tandridge district of Surrey, England, at the foot of the North Downs. It is south south-east of Croydon in Greater London, west of Sevenoaks in Kent, and north of East Grinstead in West Sussex.
Oxted ...
,
Dorking
Dorking () is a market town in Surrey in South East England, about south of London. It is in Mole Valley District and the council headquarters are to the east of the centre. The High Street runs roughly east–west, parallel to the Pipp Br ...
,
Horsham,
Haywards Heath,
Burgess Hill
Burgess Hill is a town and civil parish in West Sussex, England, close to the border with East Sussex, on the edge of the South Downs National Park, south of London, north of Brighton and Hove, and northeast of the county town, Chichester. It ...
and
East Grinstead.
The borough of Crawley is bordered by the districts of
Mid Sussex and
Horsham in
West Sussex
West Sussex is a county in South East England on the English Channel coast. The ceremonial county comprises the shire districts of Adur, Arun, Chichester, Horsham, and Mid Sussex, and the boroughs of Crawley and Worthing. Covering an ...
as well as the districts of
Mole Valley
Mole Valley is a local government district in Surrey, England. Its council is based in Dorking.
The other town in the district is Leatherhead. The largest villages are Ashtead, Fetcham and Great Bookham, in the northern third of the district. ...
and
Tandridge
Tandridge is a village and civil parish in the Tandridge District, in the county of Surrey, England. Its nucleus is on a rise of the Greensand Ridge between Oxted and Godstone. It includes, towards its middle one named sub-locality (hamlet), ...
and the borough of
Reigate and Banstead
Reigate and Banstead is a local government district with borough status in east Surrey, England. It includes the towns of Reigate, Redhill, Horley and Banstead. The borough borders the Borough of Crawley (in West Sussex) to the south, the Boro ...
in
Surrey
Surrey () is a ceremonial and non-metropolitan county in South East England, bordering Greater London to the south west. Surrey has a large rural area, and several significant urban areas which form part of the Greater London Built-up Area. ...
.
Crawley lies in the
Weald
The Weald () is an area of South East England between the parallel chalk escarpments of the North and the South Downs. It crosses the counties of Hampshire, Surrey, Sussex and Kent. It has three separate parts: the sandstone "High Weald" in the ...
between the
North
North is one of the four compass points or cardinal directions. It is the opposite of south and is perpendicular to east and west. ''North'' is a noun, adjective, or adverb indicating Direction (geometry), direction or geography.
Etymology
T ...
and
South Downs
The South Downs are a range of chalk hills that extends for about across the south-eastern coastal counties of England from the Itchen valley of Hampshire in the west to Beachy Head, in the Eastbourne Downland Estate, East Sussex, in the eas ...
. Two beds of
sedimentary rock
Sedimentary rocks are types of rock that are formed by the accumulation or deposition of mineral or organic particles at Earth's surface, followed by cementation. Sedimentation is the collective name for processes that cause these particles ...
meet beneath the town: the eastern neighbourhoods and the town centre lie largely on the
sandstone
Sandstone is a clastic sedimentary rock composed mainly of sand-sized (0.0625 to 2 mm) silicate grains. Sandstones comprise about 20–25% of all sedimentary rocks.
Most sandstone is composed of quartz or feldspar (both silicates) ...
Hastings Beds, while the rest of the town is based on
Weald Clay
Weald Clay or the Weald Clay Formation is a Lower Cretaceous sedimentary rock unit underlying areas of South East England, between the North and South Downs, in an area called the Weald Basin. It is the uppermost unit of the Wealden Group of ro ...
.
A
geological fault running from east to west has left an area of Weald Clay (with a ridge of
limestone
Limestone ( calcium carbonate ) is a type of carbonate sedimentary rock which is the main source of the material lime. It is composed mostly of the minerals calcite and aragonite, which are different crystal forms of . Limestone forms whe ...
) jutting into the Hastings Beds around
Tilgate
Tilgate is one of 14 neighbourhoods within the town of Crawley in West Sussex, England. The area contains a mixture of privately developed housing, self-build groups and ex-council housing. It is bordered by the districts of Furnace Green to the ...
.
The highest point in the borough is above sea level.
The town has no major waterways, although a number of smaller brooks and streams are tributaries for the
River Mole
The River Mole is a tributary of the River Thames in southern England. It rises in West Sussex near Gatwick Airport and flows northwest through Surrey for to the Thames at Hampton Court Palace. The river gives its name to the Surrey distri ...
which rises near Gatwick Airport and flows northwards to the
River Thames
The River Thames ( ), known alternatively in parts as the The Isis, River Isis, is a river that flows through southern England including London. At , it is the longest river entirely in England and the Longest rivers of the United Kingdom, se ...
near
Hampton Court Palace. There are several lakes at
Tilgate Park
Tilgate Park is a large recreational park situated south of Tilgate, South-East Crawley. It is the largest and most popular park in the area.
Originally a part of the ancient Worth Forest, the park and adjacent areas (including the modern-day ...
and a mill pond at Ifield which was stopped to feed the
Ifield Water Mill.
In 1822
Gideon Mantell
Gideon Algernon Mantell MRCS FRS (3 February 1790 – 10 November 1852) was a British obstetrician, geologist and palaeontologist. His attempts to reconstruct the structure and life of ''Iguanodon'' began the scientific study of dinosaurs: in ...
, an amateur fossil collector and
palaeontologist
Paleontology (), also spelled palaeontology or palæontology, is the scientific study of life that existed prior to, and sometimes including, the start of the Holocene epoch (roughly 11,700 years before present). It includes the study of fossi ...
, discovered teeth, bones and other remains of what he described as "an animal of the lizard tribe of enormous magnitude", in Tilgate Forest on the edge of Crawley. He announced his discovery in an 1825 scientific paper, giving the creature the name
Iguanodon
''Iguanodon'' ( ; meaning ' iguana-tooth'), named in 1825, is a genus of iguanodontian dinosaur. While many species have been classified in the genus ''Iguanodon'', dating from the late Jurassic Period to the early Cretaceous Period of Asia, ...
.
In 1832 he discovered and named the
Hylaeosaurus
''Hylaeosaurus'' ( ; Greek: / "belonging to the forest" and / "lizard") is a herbivorous ankylosaurian dinosaur that lived about 136 million years ago, in the late Valanginian stage of the early Cretaceous period of England. It was found ...
genus of dinosaurs after finding a fossil in the same forest.
Climate
Crawley lies within the Sussex Weald, an area of highly variable terrain so that many microclimates of frost hollows, sun traps and windswept hilltops will be encountered over a short distance. During calm, clear periods of weather this allows for some interesting temperature variations, although most of the time, when mobile westerly airstreams persist, the weather is typically
Oceanic
Oceanic may refer to:
*Of or relating to the ocean
*Of or relating to Oceania
**Oceanic climate
**Oceanic languages
**Oceanic person or people, also called "Pacific Islander(s)"
Places
* Oceanic, British Columbia, a settlement on Smith Island, ...
like the rest of the British Isles. Gatwick is the nearest weather station that publishes long-term averages that give an accurate description of the climate of the Crawley area, although more recently the Met Office has also published data for its nearby weather station at
Charlwood
Charlwood is a village and civil parish in the Mole Valley district of Surrey, England. It is immediately northwest of London Gatwick Airport in West Sussex, close west of Horley and north of Crawley. The historic county boundary between Surre ...
. Both weather stations are about 3 miles north of Crawley town centre and at similar altitudes.
Generally, Crawley's inland and southerly position within the UK means temperatures in summer are amongst the highest in the British Isles, Charlwood recording 36.3C (97.3F) and Gatwick recording 36.4C (97.5F) on 19 July 2006, just 0.2C and 0.1C lower, respectively, than the UK monthly record for that day set at Wisley, 20 miles to the west. The overall maximum stands at 36.5C (97.7F) at Charlwood, set on 10 August 2003. The absolute record for Gatwick is the aforementioned 36.4C. Before this, the highest temperature recorded at Gatwick was 35.6C (96.1F), also in August 2003. The maximum temperature was 25.1C (77.2F) or higher on 15.9 days of the year on average (1971-00) and the warmest day will typically rise to 29.4C (84.9F).
The overall minimum for Gatwick Airport for the period from 1960 is −16.7C (1.9F), set in January 1963. More recently, Charlwood fell to −11.2C (11.8F) and Gatwick −11.1C (12.0F) on 20 December 2010. Typically the coldest night at Gatwick will fall to −8.9C (16.0F). Air frost is recorded on 58.2 nights at Gatwick (1971-00)
Sunshine totals in Crawley are higher than many inland areas due to its southerly location: Gatwick averaged 1,574 hours per year over 1961–90. No data is available for 1971 to 2000, but given increases at comparable sites nearby, annual averages are likely to be over 1,600 hours.
Snowfall is often heavier in the Sussex Weald than in many other low-lying parts of central and southern England due to the proximity of moisture-laden southerly tracking low-pressure systems bringing easterly winds and snow to areas from South London southwards. However, again due to the southerly location of the area, with warmer air from the nearby English Channel, the snow is often temporary as low-pressure systems track north bringing in milder air; areas immediately north of London tend to have less accumulation, but lying for a longer duration.
Rainfall is lower than the English average, but higher than many other areas of the South East. 1mm of rain or more falls on 116.7 days of the year.
Neighbourhoods and areas
![Lowfield Heath (E) 01](https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/7/7b/Lowfield_Heath_%28E%29_01.JPG)
There are 14 residential neighbourhoods,
each with a variety of housing types: terraced, semi-detached and detached houses, low-rise flats and bungalows. There are no residential tower blocks, apart from the 8-storey Milton Mount Flats at the North end of Pound Hill.
Many houses have their own gardens and are set back from roads. The hub of each neighbourhood is a shopping parade, community centre and church, and each has a school and recreational open spaces as well.
Crawley Development Corporation
Crawley Development Corporation was set up in February 1947 by the Government of the United Kingdom to establish, administer and control the development of the New Town of Crawley in accordance with the New Towns Act 1946. The Corporation had t ...
's intention was for neighbourhood shops to cater only to basic needs, and for the town centre to be used for most shopping requirements. The number of shop units provided in the neighbourhood parades reflected this: despite the master plan making provision for at least 20 shops in each neighbourhood,
the number actually built ranged from 19 in the outlying Langley Green neighbourhood to just seven in West Green, close to the town centre.
Each of the 14 residential neighbourhoods is identified by a colour, which is shown on street name signs in a standard format throughout the town: below the street name, the neighbourhood name is shown in white text on a coloured background.
There are areas which are not defined as neighbourhoods but which are closely associated with Crawley:
* The
Manor Royal
Manor Royal is an industrial zone within the town of Crawley in West Sussex, England. Manor Royal is in the north of the town near to Gatwick Airport. The area is devoted to light industry and offices and was designed for industry as part of t ...
industrial estate is in the north of the town. Although it is part of the Northgate ward, it is allocated a colour: its street name signs feature the word "Industrial" on a black background.
* Crawley's town centre is in the southernmost part of Northgate. Its street name signs do not follow the standard format of the neighbourhood signs but display only the street name.
*
Gatwick Airport
Gatwick Airport (), also known as London Gatwick , is a major international airport near Crawley, West Sussex, England, south of Central London. In 2021, Gatwick was the third-busiest airport by total passenger traffic in the UK, after H ...
was built on the site of a manor house, Gatwick Manor, close to the village of
Lowfield Heath
Lowfield Heath is a former village within the boundaries of the Borough of Crawley, West Sussex, England. Situated on the main London to Brighton road approximately south of London and north of Crawley, it was gradually rendered uninhabit ...
. Most of the village was demolished when the airport expanded, but the
Grade II*-listed St Michael and All Angels Church,
remains. The site of Lowfield Heath village, now occupied by warehouses and light industrial units,
is on the airport's southern boundary, between the perimeter road and the A23 close to Manor Royal.
*
Worth was originally a village with its own civil parish, lying just beyond the eastern edge of the Crawley urban area and borough boundary; but the development of the Pound Hill and Maidenbower neighbourhoods has filled in the gaps, and the borough boundary has been extended to include the whole of the village. The civil parish of
Worth remains, albeit reduced in size, as part of the
Mid Sussex district.
*
Tinsley Green
Tinsley Green is an area in the Borough of Crawley, one of seven local government districts in the English county of West Sussex. Originally a hamlet in the parish of Worth, it was absorbed by the New Town of Crawley in the 1940s and became ...
, a
hamlet
''The Tragedy of Hamlet, Prince of Denmark'', often shortened to ''Hamlet'' (), is a tragedy written by William Shakespeare sometime between 1599 and 1601. It is Shakespeare's longest play, with 29,551 words. Set in Denmark, the play depicts ...
in
Worth parish,
is now within the Forge Wood neighbourhood. Its houses, farms and public house, the Greyhound (at which the
British and World Marbles Championship
British may refer to:
Peoples, culture, and language
* British people, nationals or natives of the United Kingdom, British Overseas Territories, and Crown Dependencies.
** Britishness, the British identity and common culture
* British English, ...
has been held annually since 1932),
lie on or around an east–west minor road running from the main
Balcombe
Balcombe is a village and civil parish in the Mid Sussex District of West Sussex, England. It lies south of London, north of Brighton, and east north east of the county town of Chichester. Nearby towns include Crawley to the north west and H ...
–
Horley
Horley is a town in the borough of Reigate and Banstead in Surrey, England, south of the towns of Reigate and Redhill. The county border with West Sussex is to the south with Crawley and Gatwick Airport close to the town.
It has its own eco ...
road to the Manor Royal estate.
* The hamlet of
Fernhill is east of Gatwick Airport
and the same distance south of
Horley
Horley is a town in the borough of Reigate and Banstead in Surrey, England, south of the towns of Reigate and Redhill. The county border with West Sussex is to the south with Crawley and Gatwick Airport close to the town.
It has its own eco ...
.
It has been wholly within the borough since 1990, when the borough and county boundary was moved eastwards to align exactly with the M23 motorway.
Until then, its houses and farms straddled the boundary.
Fernhill was the site of a fatal aeroplane crash in 1969: 50 people (including two residents) died when
Ariana Afghan Airlines Flight 701
Ariana Afghan Airlines Flight 701 was the flight involved in a fatal air accident on 5 January 1969, when a Boeing 727 with 62 people on board crashed into a house on its approach to London Gatwick Airport in heavy fog. Due to pilot error the fl ...
crashed into a house on Fernhill Road.
Demography
![Crawley Population Graph](https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/3/3a/Crawley_Population_Graph.png)
At the
census
A census is the procedure of systematically acquiring, recording and calculating information about the members of a given population. This term is used mostly in connection with national population and housing censuses; other common censuses incl ...
in 2011 the population of Crawley was recorded as 106,597.
The 2001 census data showed that population then accounted for 13.2% of the population of the county of West Sussex. The growth in population of the new town—around 1,000% between 1951 and 2001
—has outstripped that of most similar-sized settlements. For example, in the same period, the population of the neighbouring district of Horsham grew by just 99%.
Approximately 64.5% of the population is aged below 45, compared to 55% of the population of West Sussex.
White British
White British is an ethnicity classification used for the native white population identifying as English, Scottish, Welsh, Cornish, Northern Irish, or British in the United Kingdom Census. In the 2011 census, the White British population wa ...
account for 84.5% of the population and 15.5% of people are from other ethnic backgrounds. People of Indian and Pakistani origin account for 4.5% and 3% of the population respectively. Many inhabitants of Crawley work locally at Gatwick Airport as either air or ground crew.
Many
Chagossians
The Chagossians (also Îlois or Chagos Islanders) are a currently exiled Creole ethnic group native to the Chagos Islands, specifically Diego Garcia, Peros Banhos, and the Salomon island chain, as well as other parts of the Chagos Archipelago ...
expelled from the
Chagos Archipelago
The Chagos Archipelago () or Chagos Islands (formerly the Bassas de Chagas, and later the Oil Islands) is a group of seven atolls comprising more than 60 islands in the Indian Ocean about 500 kilometres (310 mi) south of the Maldives arch ...
in the
Indian Ocean
The Indian Ocean is the third-largest of the world's five oceanic divisions, covering or ~19.8% of the water on Earth's surface. It is bounded by Asia to the north, Africa to the west and Australia to the east. To the south it is bounded by th ...
settled in Crawley in the 1960s and 1970s, and it was reported in 2016 that the town's Chagossian community numbered approximately 3,000 people.
Crawley MP
Henry Smith stated that Crawley "is home to perhaps the largest Chagossian population in the world".
The borough has a population density of around 22 persons per hectare
(9 persons per acre), making it the second most densely populated district in West Sussex, after
Worthing
Worthing () is a seaside town in West Sussex, England, at the foot of the South Downs, west of Brighton, and east of Chichester. With a population of 111,400 and an area of , the borough is the second largest component of the Brighton and Ho ...
. The social mix is similar to the national norm: around 50% are in the ABC1
social category,
although this varies by ward, with just 44% in Broadfield North
compared to 75% in Maidenbower.
The proportion of people in the borough with higher education qualifications is lower than the national average. Around 14% have a qualification at
level 4 or above, compared to 20% nationally.
Economy
Crawley originally traded as a market town. The
Development Corporation
Development corporations or development firms are organizations established by governments in several countries for the purpose of urban development. They often are responsible for the development of new suburban areas or the redevelopment of exi ...
intended to develop it as a centre for manufacturing and light engineering, with an industrial zone.
The rapid growth of Gatwick Airport provided opportunities for businesses in the aviation, transport, warehousing and distribution industries. The significance of the airport to local employment and enterprise was reflected by the formation of the Gatwick Diamond partnership. This venture, supported by local businesses, local government and
SEEDA, South East England's
Regional Development Agency, aims to maintain and improve the Crawley and Gatwick area's status as a region of national and international economic importance.
Since the Second World War, unemployment in Crawley has been low: the rate was 1.47% of the working-age population in 2003.
During the boom of the 1980s the town boasted the lowest level of unemployment in the UK.
Continuous growth and investment have made Crawley one of the most important business and employment centres in the
South East England
South East England is one of the nine official regions of England at the ITL 1 statistical regions of England, first level of International Territorial Level, ITL for Statistics, statistical purposes. It consists of the counties of england, ...
region.
In April 2020, the
Centre for Cities
The Centre for Cities is an independent, non-partisan urban policy research unit and a charity registered in England. The Centre's main goal is to understand how and why economic growth and change takes place in the United Kingdom's cities.
Hi ...
thinktank identified Crawley as the place in
Britain
Britain most often refers to:
* The United Kingdom, a sovereign state in Europe comprising the island of Great Britain, the north-eastern part of the island of Ireland and many smaller islands
* Great Britain, the largest island in the United King ...
at the highest risk of widespread job losses due to the
coronavirus' effect on the economy; classing 56% of jobs in the town as either vulnerable or very vulnerable of being
furloughed or lost.
Manufacturing industry
Crawley was already a modest industrial centre by the end of the Second World War. Building was an important trade: 800 people were employed by building and joinery firms, and two—Longley's and Cook's—were large enough to have their own factories.
In 1949, 1,529 people worked in manufacturing: the main industries were light and
precision engineering
Precision engineering is a subdiscipline of electrical engineering, software engineering, electronics engineering, mechanical engineering, and optical engineering concerned with designing machines, fixtures, and other structures that have exce ...
and aircraft repair. Many of the jobs in these industries were highly skilled.
Industrial development had to take place relatively soon after the new town was established because part of the Corporation's remit was to move people and jobs out of an overcrowded and war-damaged London. Industrial jobs were needed as well as houses and shops to create a balanced community where people could settle.
The Development Corporation wanted the new town to support a large and mixed industrial base, with factories and other buildings based in a single zone rather than spread throughout the town. A
site in the northeastern part of the development area was chosen. Its advantages included flat land with no existing development; proximity to the London–Brighton railway line, the A23 and the planned M23; space for railway sidings (which were eventually built on a much smaller scale than envisaged); and an adjacent site reserved for future expansion, on the other side of the railway line (again, not used for this purpose in the end).
Princess Elizabeth (later Queen Elizabeth II) opened the first part of the industrial area on 25 January 1950;
its main road was named Manor Royal, and this name eventually came to refer to the whole estate.
The Corporation stipulated that several
manufacturing industries
Manufacturing is the creation or production of goods with the help of equipment, labor, machines, tools, and chemical or biological processing or formulation. It is the essence of secondary sector of the economy. The term may refer to a range ...
should be developed, rather than allowing one sector or firm to dominate. It did not seek to attract companies by offering financial or other incentives; instead, it set out to create the ideal conditions for industrial development to arise naturally, by providing large plots of land with room for expansion, allowing firms to build their own premises or rent ready-made buildings, and constructing a wide range of building types and sizes.
Despite the lack of direct incentives, many firms applied to move to the Manor Royal estate: it was considered such an attractive place to relocate to that the Development Corporation was able to choose between applicants to achieve the ideal mix of firms, and little advertising or promotion had to be undertaken.
One year after Manor Royal was opened, eighteen firms were trading there, including four with more than 100 employees and one with more than 1,000.
By 1964, businesses which had moved to the town since 1950 employed 16,000 people; the master plan had anticipated between 8,000 and 8,500. In 1978 there were 105 such firms, employing nearly 20,000 people.
Thales Group
Thales Group () is a French multinational company that designs, develops and manufactures electrical systems as well as devices and equipment for the aerospace, defence, transportation and security sectors. The company is headquartered in Paris' ...
opened a new manufacturing and office complex in Crawley in 2009. The site consolidated manufacturing and offices in the Crawley area and the south-east of England.
Service industry and commerce
![VirginTheOffice02](https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/2/20/VirginTheOffice02.jpg)
While most of the jobs created in the new town's early years were in manufacturing, the
tertiary sector
The tertiary sector of the economy, generally known as the service sector, is the third of the three economic sectors in the three-sector model (also known as the economic cycle). The others are the primary sector (raw materials) and the second ...
developed strongly from the 1960s. The
Manor Royal
Manor Royal is an industrial zone within the town of Crawley in West Sussex, England. Manor Royal is in the north of the town near to Gatwick Airport. The area is devoted to light industry and offices and was designed for industry as part of t ...
estate, with its space, proximity to Gatwick Airport and good transport links, attracted airport-related services such as logistics, catering, distribution and warehousing; and the corporation and private companies built offices throughout the town. Office floorspace in the town increased from in 1965 to a conservative estimate of in 1984.
Major schemes during that period included premises for the
Westminster Bank
Westminster Bank was a British retail bank which operated in England and Wales from 1834 until its merger into the National Westminster Bank in 1970; it continued to exist as a dormant registered non-trading company until 4 July 2017 when it ...
British Caledonian
British Caledonian (BCal) was a British private independent airline which operated out of Gatwick Airport in south-east England during the 1970s and 1980s. It was created as an alternative to the British government-controlled corporation airlin ...
and
The Office of the Paymaster-General.
The five-storey Overline House above the railway station, completed in 1968, is used by Crawley's NHS
primary care trust and various other companies.
![SchlumbergerHouseGatwick](https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/4/45/SchlumbergerHouseGatwick.jpg)
Companies headquartered in Crawley include
Doosan Babcock Energy
Altrad Babcock Ltd (formerly ''Doosan Babcock Ltd.'') is part of Altrad.
It is a power sector OEM, construction, upgrade, and after-market services company that offers specialist services and technologies to the fossil-fired power generation, ...
,
WesternGeco
WesternGeco is a geophysical services company. It is headquartered in Schlumberger House on the property of London Gatwick Airport in Crawley, West Sussex, in Greater London.
__NOTOC__
Background
The company provides reservoir imaging, moni ...
,
Virgin Atlantic
Virgin Atlantic, a trading name of Virgin Atlantic Airways Limited and Virgin Atlantic International Limited, is a British airline with its head office in Crawley, England. The airline was established in 1984 as British Atlantic Airways, and ...
,
Virgin Atlantic's associated travel agency
Virgin Holidays,
William Reed Business Media
William Reed is a digital, high value data and events business serving the food and drinks sector. In 2021, it had offices in five locations - in Crawley, London, Montpellier, Singapore and Chicago.
Early history
In 1862, William Reed found ...
,
Dualit
Dualit is a British manufacturer of coffee and tea capsules, kitchen and catering equipment and is best known for its range of heavy-duty toasters. Although it was primarily designed for the commercial catering market, its domestic usage increa ...
and the Office of the Paymaster-General.
Danish company
Novo Nordisk
Novo Nordisk A/S is a Danish multinational pharmaceutical company headquartered in Bagsværd, Denmark, with production facilities in nine countries, and affiliates or offices in five countries. Novo Nordisk is controlled by majority shareholder ...
, which manufactures much of the world's
insulin
Insulin (, from Latin ''insula'', 'island') is a peptide hormone produced by beta cells of the pancreatic islets encoded in humans by the ''INS'' gene. It is considered to be the main anabolic hormone of the body. It regulates the metabolism o ...
supply, has its UK headquarters at the Broadfield Business Park,
and
BDO Global
BDO (an acronym for Binder Dijker Otte) is an international network of public accounting, tax, consulting and business advisory firms that provide professional services under the name BDO. It is the fifth-largest accounting network in the wor ...
has an office in Crawley. The UK headquarters of
Nestlé
Nestlé S.A. (; ; ) is a Swiss multinational food and drink processing conglomerate corporation headquartered in Vevey, Vaud, Switzerland. It is the largest publicly held food company in the world, measured by revenue and other metrics, since ...
is in the Manor Royal area of Crawley. In addition the registered offices of TUI UK and
Thomson Airways Thomson may refer to:
Names
* Thomson (surname), a list of people with this name and a description of its origin
* Thomson baronets, four baronetcies created for persons with the surname Thomson
Businesses and organizations
* SGS-Thomson Mic ...
are located in Crawley.
British Airways
British Airways (BA) is the flag carrier airline of the United Kingdom. It is headquartered in London, England, near its main hub at Heathrow Airport.
The airline is the second largest UK-based carrier, based on fleet size and passengers ...
took over
British Caledonian
British Caledonian (BCal) was a British private independent airline which operated out of Gatwick Airport in south-east England during the 1970s and 1980s. It was created as an alternative to the British government-controlled corporation airlin ...
's former headquarters near the Manor Royal estate, renamed it "Astral Towers" and based its British Airways Holidays and
Air Miles divisions there.
Other companies formerly headquartered in Crawley include
Astraeus Airlines
Astraeus Limited, trading as Astraeus Airlines, was a British airline based at Astraeus House in Crawley, West Sussex, England. Founded in 2002, and named after the Greek God of the dusk, it entered administration on 21 November 2011, ceasin ...
,
British United Airways
British United Airways (BUA) was a private, independentindependent from government-owned corporations British airline formed as a result of the merger of Airwork Services and Hunting-Clan Air Transport in July 1960, making it the largest whol ...
,
[ "Head Office: Gatwick Airport, Horley. Surrey."] CityFlyer Express
CityFlyer Express was a short-haul regional airline with its head office in the Iain Stewart Centre next to London Gatwick Airport in England.
In 1993 it became the first British Airways (BA) franchisee operating as ''British Airways Express''. ...
,
CP Ships
CP Ships was a large Canadian shipping company established in the 19th century. From the late 1880s until after World War II, the company was Canada's largest operator of Atlantic and Pacific steamships. Many immigrants travelled on CP ships f ...
,
First Choice Airways
First Choice Airways Limited was a British charter airline of European tour operator TUI Travel PLC, based in Crawley, England until its merger with Thomsonfly to form Thomson Airways (now TUI Airways) in 2008. It flew to more than 60 destinat ...
,
GB Airways
GB Airways was a British airline; prior to its sale, it was headquartered in "The Beehive," a former terminal building, at City Place Gatwick, London Gatwick Airport in Crawley, West Sussex, England.
The airline was originally created as ' ...
,
Laker Airways
Laker Airways was a private British airline founded by Sir Freddie Laker in 1966. It was originally a charter airline flying passengers and cargo worldwide. Its head office was located at Gatwick Airport in Crawley, England.
It became the sec ...
,
Tradewinds Airways
Tradewinds Airways Ltd was a British all-cargo airline. Its head office was located in Timberham House, on the property of London Gatwick Airport in Crawley, England.
History
Tradewinds was founded in November 1968 after the collapse of ...
, and
Air Europe
Air Europe was a wholly privately owned, independentindependent from government-owned corporations British airline, established in 1978 under the working title Inter European Airways.Simons It adopted the Air Europe name the following year. Its ...
.
Crawley has numerous hotels, including
The George Hotel, dated to 1615. It is reputedly haunted.
Shopping and retail
![Crawley - County Mall (Friary Way Entrance)](https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/f/fa/Crawley_-_County_Mall_%28Friary_Way_Entrance%29.JPG)
Even before the new town was planned, Crawley was a retail centre for the surrounding area: there were 177 shops in the town in 1948,
99 of which were on the High Street.
Early new town residents relied on these shopping facilities until the Corporation implemented the master plan's designs for a new shopping area on the mostly undeveloped land east of the High Street and north of the railway line.
The Broadwalk and its 23 shops were built in 1954, followed by the Queen's Square complex and surrounding streets in the mid-1950s.
Queen's Square, a pedestrianised plaza surrounded by large shops and linked to the High Street by The Broadwalk, was officially opened in 1958 by Queen Elizabeth II.
The town centre was completed by 1960, by which time Crawley was already recognised as an important regional, rather than merely local, shopping centre.
In the 1960s and 1970s, large branches of
Tesco
Tesco plc () is a British multinational groceries and general merchandise retailer headquartered in Welwyn Garden City, England. In 2011 it was the third-largest retailer in the world measured by gross revenues and the ninth-largest in th ...
,
Sainsbury's
J Sainsbury plc, trading as Sainsbury's, is the second largest chain of supermarkets in the United Kingdom, with a 14.6% share of UK supermarket sales.
Founded in 1869 by John James Sainsbury with a shop in Drury Lane, London, the company ...
and
Marks & Spencer
Marks and Spencer Group plc (commonly abbreviated to M&S and colloquially known as Marks's or Marks & Sparks) is a major British multinational retailer with headquarters in Paddington, London that specialises in selling clothing, beauty, home ...
were opened (the Tesco superstore was the largest in Britain at the time). The shopping area was also expanded southeastwards from Queen's Square: although the original plans of 1975 were not implemented fully, several large shop units were built and a new pedestrianised link—The Martlets—was provided between Queen's Square and Haslett Avenue, the main road to Three Bridges.
The remaining land between this area and the railway line was sold for private development by 1982;
in 1992 a
shopping centre named County Mall and anchored by an
Owen Owen
Owen Owen was a Liverpool-based operator of department stores in the United Kingdom and Canada. Beginning with a drapery shop in Liverpool, a chain of department stores was built up, often by taking over rival retailers. The company remained u ...
department store was opened there.
Its stores includes major retailers such as
The Entertainer,
Boots
A boot is a type of footwear.
Boot or Boots may also refer to:
Businesses
* Boot Inn, Chester, Cheshire, England
* Boots (company), a high-street pharmacy chain and manufacturer of pharmaceuticals in the United Kingdom
* The Boot, Cromer St ...
,
WHSmith
WHSmith (also written WH Smith, and known colloquially as Smith's and formerly as W. H. Smith & Son) is a British retailer, headquartered in Swindon, England, which operates a chain of high street, railway station, airport, port, hospital and m ...
and
Superdry
Superdry plc (stylised as SUPERDRY®︎冒険魂) is a UK branded clothing company, and owner of the Superdry label. Superdry products combine vintage American styling with Japanese-inspired graphics. It is listed on the London Stock Exchange ...
as well as over 80 smaller outlets.
The town's main bus station was redesigned, roads including the main A2220 Haslett Avenue were rerouted, and some buildings at the south end of The Martlets were demolished to accommodate the mall.
A regeneration strategy for the town centre, "Centre Vision 2000", was produced in 1993.
Changes brought about by the scheme have included of additional retail space in Queen's Square and The Martlets, and a mixed-use development at the southern end of the High Street on land formerly occupied by Robinson Road (which was demolished) and Spencers Road (shortened and severed at one end). An ASDA superstore, opened in September 2003, forms the centrepiece.
Robinson Road, previously named Church Road, had been at the heart of the old Crawley: a century before its demolition, its buildings included two chapels, a school, a hospital and a post office.
Public services
![Public Services in Crawley - Crawley New Library](https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/a/ad/Public_Services_in_Crawley_-_Crawley_New_Library.JPG)
Policing in Crawley is provided by
Sussex Police; the
British Transport Police
, nativename =
, abbreviation = BTP
, patch =
, patchcaption =
, logo = British Transport Police Logo.svg
, logocaption = Logo of the British Transport Police
, badge =
, badgecaption =
, f ...
are responsible for the rail network. The borough is the police headquarters for the West Sussex division,
and is itself divided into three areas for the purposes of neighbourhood policing: Crawley East, Crawley West, and Crawley Town Centre.
A separate division covers Gatwick Airport.
There is a police station in the town centre; it is open 24 hours a day, and the front desk is staffed for 16 hours each day except Christmas Day.
Statutory emergency fire and rescue services are provided by the
West Sussex Fire and Rescue Service
The West Sussex Fire and Rescue Service is the statutory fire and rescue service for the administrative county of West Sussex, England. It is part of West Sussex County Council. , the county has 25 fire stations.
Performance
In 2018/2019, e ...
which operates a fire station in the town centre.
The
South East Coast Ambulance Service
The South East Coast Ambulance Service NHS Foundation Trust (SECAmb) is the NHS ambulance services trust for south-eastern England, covering Kent (including Medway), Surrey, West Sussex and East Sussex (including Brighton and Hove). It also co ...
is responsible for ambulance and paramedic services.
Crawley Hospital
Crawley Hospital is a National Health Service hospital in Crawley, a town and borough in West Sussex, England. Since 2006 it has been part of the Sussex Community NHS Trust, which has overall management responsibility. Surrey and Sussex Healthc ...
in West Green is operated by West Sussex
Primary Care Trust. Some services are provided by the Surrey and Sussex Healthcare
NHS Trust
An NHS trust is an organisational unit within the National Health Services of England and Wales, generally serving either a geographical area or a specialised function (such as an ambulance service). In any particular location there may be several ...
, including a 24-hour Urgent Treatment Centre for semi-life-threatening injuries.
The Surrey and Sussex was judged as "weak" by the
Healthcare Commission
The Healthcare Commission was a non-departmental public body sponsored by the Department of Health of the United Kingdom. It was set up to promote and drive improvement in the quality of health care and public health in England and Wales. It aime ...
in 2008,
however in 2015 both the hospital
and the Surrey and Sussex Trust
were rated good by the
Care Quality Commission
The Care Quality Commission (CQC) is an executive non-departmental public body of the Department of Health and Social Care of the United Kingdom. It was established in 2009 to regulate and inspect health and social care services in England.
I ...
.
Thames Water
Thames Water Utilities Ltd, known as Thames Water, is a large private utility company responsible for the public water supply and waste water treatment in most of Greater London, Luton, the Thames Valley, Surrey, Gloucestershire, north Wiltsh ...
is responsible for all waste water and sewerage provision. Residents in most parts of Crawley receive their drinking water from
Southern Water
Southern Water is the private utility company responsible for the public wastewater collection and treatment in Hampshire, the Isle of Wight, West Sussex, East Sussex and Kent, and for the public water supply and distribution in approximately ...
; areas in the north of the town around Gatwick Airport are provided by Sutton & East Surrey Water; and South East Water supplies Maidenbower.
UK Power Networks
UK Power Networks is a distribution network operator for electricity covering South East England, the East of England and London. It manages three licensed distribution networks (Eastern Power Networks, South Eastern Power Networks and London Pow ...
is the
distribution network operator
A distribution network operator (DNO), also known as a distribution system operator (DSO), is the operator of the electric power distribution system which delivers electricity to most end users. Each country may have many local distribution networ ...
responsible for electricity.
Gas is supplied by
Southern Gas Networks who own and manage the South East Local Distribution Zone.
The provision of public services was made in co-operation with the local authorities as the town grew in the 1950s and 1960s. They oversaw the opening of a fire station in 1958, the telephone exchange, police station and town centre health clinic in 1961 and an ambulance station in 1963. Plans for a new hospital on land at The Hawth were abandoned, however, and the existing hospital in West Green was redeveloped instead.
Gas was piped from Croydon, away, and a gasworks at Redhill, while the town's water supply came from the
Weir Wood
Weir Wood Reservoir is a biological Site of Special Scientific Interest west of Forest Row in East Sussex. It is in High Weald Area of Outstanding Natural Beauty and an area of is a Local Nature Reserve which is owned by Southern Water a ...
reservoir south of East Grinstead and another at
Pease Pottage
Pease Pottage is a village in the Mid Sussex District of West Sussex, England. It lies on the southern edge of the Crawley built-up area, in the civil parish of Slaugham.
The village has a motorway service station, named after the village ...
.
In December 2008, a new three-storey library was opened in new buildings at Southgate Avenue, replacing the considerably undersized establishment formerly at County Buildings.
The
Civil Aviation Authority Regulation Safety Group is in the Aviation House in
Gatwick Airport
Gatwick Airport (), also known as London Gatwick , is a major international airport near Crawley, West Sussex, England, south of Central London. In 2021, Gatwick was the third-busiest airport by total passenger traffic in the UK, after H ...
in Crawley.
Transport
Crawley's early development as a market town was helped by its location on the London–Brighton turnpike. The area was joined to the
railway network in the mid-19th century; and since the creation of the new town, there have been major road upgrades (including a motorway link), a
guided bus transit system and the establishment of an airport which has become one of Britain's largest and busiest.
Road
The London–Brighton turnpike ran through the centre of Crawley, forming the High Street and Station Road. When Britain's major roads were classified by the British government's Ministry of Transport between 1919 and 1923,
it was given the number
A23. It was bypassed by a new dual carriageway in 1938
(which forms the A23's current route through the town), and then later to the east side of the town by the
M23 motorway
The M23 is a motorway in the United Kingdom, running from the south of Hooley in Surrey, where it splits from the A23, to Pease Pottage, south of Crawley in West Sussex where it rejoins the A23. The northern end of the motorway starts on what ...
, which was opened in 1975. This connects London's orbital motorway, the
M25, to the A23 at
Pease Pottage
Pease Pottage is a village in the Mid Sussex District of West Sussex, England. It lies on the southern edge of the Crawley built-up area, in the civil parish of Slaugham.
The village has a motorway service station, named after the village ...
, at the southern edge of Crawley's built-up area. The original single-carriageway A23 became the A2219.
The M23 has junctions in the Crawley area at the A2011/
A264
A, or a, is the first letter and the first vowel of the Latin alphabet, used in the modern English alphabet, the alphabets of other western European languages and others worldwide. Its name in English is ''a'' (pronounced ), plural ''aes'' ...
(Junction 10) and Maidenbower (area of Crawley) (Junction 10A). The end of the motorway at Pease Pottage is Junction 11. The A2011, another dual-carriageway, joins the A23 in West Green and provides a link, via the A2004, to the town centre. The A2220 follows the former route of the A264 through the town, linking the A23 directly to the A264 at
Copthorne, from where it then runs to
East Grinstead.
Rail
![Crawley Station 01 (07-07-2007)](https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/2/27/Crawley_Station_01_%2807-07-2007%29.JPG)
The first railway line in the area was the
Brighton Main Line
The Brighton Main Line (also known as the South Central Main Line) is a major railway line in the United Kingdom that links Brighton, on the south coast of England, with central London. In London the line has two branches, out of and station ...
, which opened as far as
Haywards Heath on 12 July 1841 and reached Brighton on 21 September 1841. It ran through Three Bridges, which was then a small village east of Crawley, and
a station was built to serve it.
A line to
Horsham, now part of the
Arun Valley Line
The Arun Valley line, also known as the Mid Sussex line, is part of the Southern- and Thameslink-operated railway services. For the initial part of the route trains follow the Brighton Main Line, and at a junction south of Three Bridges the r ...
, was opened on 14 February 1848.
A station was provided next to Crawley High Street from that date.
A new station was constructed slightly to the east, in conjunction with the Overline House commercial development, and replaced the original station which closed on 28 July 1968. The ticket office and Up (London-bound) platform waiting areas form the ground floor of the office building.
The urban area of Crawley is served by a total of three rail stations including
Ifield railway station
Ifield railway station (pronounced 'Eye-field') serves the neighbourhoods of Ifield and Gossops Green in the West Sussex town of Crawley, England. It is on the Arun Valley Line, down the line from , measured via Redhill. Train services are p ...
. Due to Crawley's expansion this station is now surrounded by the town's western areas. Opened as ''Lyons Crossing Halt'' on 1 June 1907 to serve the village of Ifield, it was soon renamed ''Ifield Halt'', dropping the "Halt" suffix in 1930.
Regular train services run from Crawley, and also Ifield, to
London Victoria
Victoria station, also known as London Victoria, is a central London railway terminus and connected London Underground station in Victoria, in the City of Westminster, managed by Network Rail. Named after the nearby Victoria Street (not the Q ...
and
London Bridge
Several bridges named London Bridge have spanned the River Thames between the City of London and Southwark, in central London. The current crossing, which opened to traffic in 1973, is a box girder bridge built from concrete and steel. It r ...
stations,
Gatwick Airport
Gatwick Airport (), also known as London Gatwick , is a major international airport near Crawley, West Sussex, England, south of Central London. In 2021, Gatwick was the third-busiest airport by total passenger traffic in the UK, after H ...
,
East Croydon
East Croydon is a railway station and tram stop in Croydon, Greater London, England, and is located in Travelcard Zone 5. At from , it is one of the busiest non-terminal stations in London, and in the United Kingdom as a whole. It is one of t ...
,
Horsham,
Bognor Regis
Bognor Regis (), sometimes simply known as Bognor (), is a town and seaside resort in West Sussex on the south coast of England, south-west of London, west of Brighton, south-east of Chichester and east of Portsmouth. Other nearby towns i ...
,
Chichester
Chichester () is a cathedral city and civil parish in West Sussex, England.OS Explorer map 120: Chichester, South Harting and Selsey Scale: 1:25 000. Publisher:Ordnance Survey – Southampton B2 edition. Publishing Date:2009. It is the only ci ...
,
Portsmouth
Portsmouth ( ) is a port and city in the ceremonial county of Hampshire in southern England. The city of Portsmouth has been a unitary authority since 1 April 1997 and is administered by Portsmouth City Council.
Portsmouth is the most dens ...
and
Southampton
Southampton () is a port city in the ceremonial county of Hampshire in southern England. It is located approximately south-west of London and west of Portsmouth. The city forms part of the South Hampshire built-up area, which also covers Po ...
. Three Bridges has direct
Thameslink
Thameslink is a 24-hour main-line route in the British railway system, running from , , , and via central London to Sutton, , , Rainham, , , , and . The network opened as a through service in 1988, with severe overcrowding by 1998, carrying m ...
trains to
Bedford
Bedford is a market town in Bedfordshire, England. At the 2011 Census, the population of the Bedford built-up area (including Biddenham and Kempston) was 106,940, making it the second-largest settlement in Bedfordshire, behind Luton, whilst ...
and
Brighton
Brighton () is a seaside resort and one of the two main areas of the City of Brighton and Hove in the county of East Sussex, England. It is located south of London.
Archaeological evidence of settlement in the area dates back to the Bronze A ...
.
Bus and Fastway
![Metrobus in Crawley - YN54 AJV](https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/4/48/Metrobus_in_Crawley_-_YN54_AJV.JPG)
Crawley was one of several towns where the boundaries of
Southdown Motor Services
Southdown Motors Services Ltd (although this was the legal name of the company (until 1992) it was normally referred to as Southdown Motor Services) was a bus and coach operator in East and West Sussex and parts of Hampshire, in southern Engl ...
and
London Transport bus services met. In 1958 the companies reached an agreement which allowed them both to provide services in all parts of the town.
When the
National Bus Company was formed in 1969, its
London Country Bus Services
London Country Bus Services was a bus company that operated in South East England from 1970 until 1986, when it was split up and later sold as part of the bus deregulation programme.
History
Formation
London Country Bus Services Ltd was ...
subsidiary took responsibility for many routes, including
Green Line Coaches
Green Line is a commuter coach brand in the Home counties of England. The trademark is owned by Arriva, with services operated by Arriva Shires & Essex and Reading Buses.
Green Line had its origin in the network of coach services established ...
cross-London services which operated to distant destinations such as
Watford
Watford () is a town and borough in Hertfordshire, England, 15 miles northwest of Central London, on the River Colne.
Initially a small market town, the Grand Junction Canal encouraged the construction of paper-making mills, print works, a ...
,
Luton
Luton () is a town and unitary authority with borough status, in Bedfordshire, England. At the 2011 census, the Luton built-up area subdivision had a population of 211,228 and its built-up area, including the adjacent towns of Dunstable an ...
and
Amersham. A coach station was opened by Southdown in 1931 on the A23 at County Oak, near Lowfield Heath: it was a regular stopping point for express coaches between London and towns on the Sussex coast. This traffic started to serve Gatwick when the airport began to grow, however.
When the National Bus Company was broken up, local services were provided by the new
South West division of London Country Bus Services, which later became part of the
Arriva
Arriva plc is a British multinational public transport company headquartered in Sunderland, England.[Metrobus acquired these routes from Arriva in March 2001, and is now Crawley's main operator.] It provides local services between the neighbourhoods and town centre, and longer-distance routes to Horsham, Redhill, Tunbridge Wells
Royal Tunbridge Wells is a town in Kent, England, southeast of central London. It lies close to the border with East Sussex on the northern edge of the Weald, High Weald, whose sandstone geology is exemplified by the rock formation High Roc ...
, Worthing
Worthing () is a seaside town in West Sussex, England, at the foot of the South Downs, west of Brighton, and east of Chichester. With a population of 111,400 and an area of , the borough is the second largest component of the Brighton and Ho ...
and Brighton
Brighton () is a seaside resort and one of the two main areas of the City of Brighton and Hove in the county of East Sussex, England. It is located south of London.
Archaeological evidence of settlement in the area dates back to the Bronze A ...
.
In September 2003 a guided bus service, Fastway, began operating between Bewbush
Bewbush is one of 14 neighbourhoods in Crawley in West Sussex, England. Bewbush is located in south west Crawley and is bordered by Broadfield to the south, Ifield to the north, Kilnwood Vale to the west and Gossops Green to the north east. ...
and Gatwick Airport
Gatwick Airport (), also known as London Gatwick , is a major international airport near Crawley, West Sussex, England, south of Central London. In 2021, Gatwick was the third-busiest airport by total passenger traffic in the UK, after H ...
. A second route, from Broadfield to the Langshott area of Horley
Horley is a town in the borough of Reigate and Banstead in Surrey, England, south of the towns of Reigate and Redhill. The county border with West Sussex is to the south with Crawley and Gatwick Airport close to the town.
It has its own eco ...
, north of Gatwick Airport, was added on 27 August 2005.
Gatwick Airport
Gatwick Airport was licensed as a private airfield in August 1930. It was used during the Second World War as an RAF
The Royal Air Force (RAF) is the United Kingdom's air and space force. It was formed towards the end of the First World War on 1 April 1918, becoming the first independent air force in the world, by regrouping the Royal Flying Corps (RFC) and ...
base, and returned to civil use in 1946. There were proposals to close the airport in the late 1940s, but in 1950 the government announced that it was to be developed as London's second airport. It was closed between 1956 and 1958 for rebuilding. Her Majesty The Queen reopened it on 9 June 1958. A second terminal, the North Terminal, was built in 1988.
An agreement exists between BAA and West Sussex County Council preventing the building of a second runway before 2019. Nevertheless, consultations were launched in 2002 by the Department for Transport, at which proposals for additional facilities and runways were considered. It was agreed that there would be no further expansion at Gatwick unless it became impossible to meet growth targets at London Heathrow Airport
Heathrow Airport (), called ''London Airport'' until 1966 and now known as London Heathrow , is a major international airport in London, England. It is the largest of the six international airports in the London airport system (the others be ...
within existing pollution limits.
Sport and leisure
Crawley Town F.C.
Crawley Town Football Club is a professional association football club based in the town of Crawley, West Sussex, England. The club was founded as Crawley Football Club in 1896, changed its name to Crawley Town Football Club in 1958. The team com ...
is Crawley's main football
Football is a family of team sports that involve, to varying degrees, kicking a ball to score a goal. Unqualified, the word ''football'' normally means the form of football that is the most popular where the word is used. Sports commonly c ...
team. Formed in 1896, it moved in 1949 to a ground at Town Mead adjacent to the West Green playing fields. Demand for land near the town centre led to the club moving in 1997 to the new Broadfield Stadium
The Broadfield Stadium is a multi-purpose stadium in Crawley, England. It is currently used mostly for football matches and is the home ground of Crawley Town F.C. The stadium has a capacity of 6,134 people, and is owned by Crawley Borough Cou ...
, now owned by the borough council. As of the 2019/2020 season, Crawley Town play in League Two
The English Football League Two (often referred to as League Two for short or Sky Bet League Two for sponsorship purposes, and known as the Football League Two from 2004 until 2016) is the third and lowest division of the English Football Lea ...
, the fourth tier of league football in England. Perhaps the pinnacle of the club's history was in February 2011 when they played against Manchester United at Old Trafford
Old Trafford () is a football stadium in Old Trafford, Greater Manchester, England, and the home of Manchester United. With a capacity of 74,310 it is the largest club football stadium (and second-largest football stadium overall after Wemb ...
in the fifth round
Fifth is the ordinal form of the number five.
Fifth or The Fifth may refer to:
* Fifth Amendment to the United States Constitution, as in the expression "pleading the Fifth"
* Fifth column, a political term
* Fifth disease, a contagious rash th ...
of the F.A. Cup
The Football Association Challenge Cup, more commonly known as the FA Cup, is an annual knockout football competition in men's domestic English football. First played during the 1871–72 season, it is the oldest national football competiti ...
, a match which saw 9,000 Crawley fans make the trip to Manchester; the game was lost 1–0. The women's football club, Crawley Wasps F.C.
Crawley Wasps Ladies FC is an English women's football club, that currently plays in the FA Women's National League South. Wasps currently play at The Camping World Community Stadium, home of Horsham FC.
History
Founded in 1991, Crawley Wa ...
, plays in the FA Women's National League South, the third tier of women's football. It formed a parnership with Crawley Town in 2021. Three other local men's teams play in the Sussex County Football League
The Macron Southern Combination Football League is a football league broadly covering the counties of East Sussex, West Sussex, Surrey and South West London, England. The league consists of eight divisions – three for first teams (Premier Di ...
: Three Bridges F.C.
Three Bridges Football Club is a football club based in Three Bridges in Crawley, West Sussex, England. The club is affiliated to the Sussex County Football Association. They were established in 1901 and were founding members of the Sussex Co ...
, Oakwood F.C.
Oakwood Football Club are a football club based in Crawley, England. They were established in 1962 and joined the Sussex County League Division Three in 1984. In 2005–06 season, they were champions of the Sussex County League Division Two ...
and Ifield Galaxy F.C.. Crawley Rugby Club
Crawley Rugby club is an English rugby union club based in Crawley in West Sussex. The men's first XV currently compete in London 3 South East - a league at the eighth tier of the English rugby union system - following the club's promotion fro ...
is based in Ifield, and a golf course was constructed in 1982 at Tilgate Park
Tilgate Park is a large recreational park situated south of Tilgate, South-East Crawley. It is the largest and most popular park in the area.
Originally a part of the ancient Worth Forest, the park and adjacent areas (including the modern-day ...
. Crawley Hockey Club plays their home matches at Hazelwick School
Hazelwick School is a co-educational comprehensive school with academy status for pupils aged 11 to 18, located in Crawley, West Sussex, England.
History
Hazelwick School was built in 1953 as part of developing Crawley as a new town and wa ...
, Three Bridges. Three Bridges Cricket Club is a founding member of the Sussex Cricket League and in 2018 were promoted back to the Premier Division.
The new town's original leisure centre was in Haslett Avenue in the Three Bridges neighbourhood. Building work started in the early 1960s, and a large swimming pool opened in 1964. The site was extended to include an athletics arena by 1967, and an additional large sports hall was opened by the town mayor, Councillor Ben Clay and Prime Minister Harold Wilson
James Harold Wilson, Baron Wilson of Rievaulx, (11 March 1916 – 24 May 1995) was a British politician who served as Prime Minister of the United Kingdom twice, from October 1964 to June 1970, and again from March 1974 to April 1976. He ...
in 1974. However, the facilities became insufficient for the growing town, even though an annexe was opened in Bewbush in 1984. Athlete Zola Budd
Zola Budd (also known as Zola Pieterse; born 26 May 1966) is a South African middle-distance and long-distance runner. She competed at the 1984 Olympic Games for Great Britain and the 1992 Olympic Games for South Africa, both times in the 30 ...
had been asked to take part in a 1,500-metre race as part of the opening celebrations, but her invitation was withdrawn at short notice because of concerns raised by council members about possible "political connotations and anti-apartheid demonstrators".
In 2005, Crawley Leisure Centre was closed and replaced by a new facility, the K2 Leisure Centre
K2 is a sports and leisure facility covering 57,194 m2 in Pease Pottage Hill Crawley, UK.
Development
The building belongs to Crawley Borough Council and was completed in 2005 for £25.76m. It replaced Crawley leisure centre (built in ...
, on the campus of Thomas Bennett Community College
Thomas Bennett Community College (TBCC) is a secondary school with academy status for pupils aged 11 to 19. It caters to approximately 1200 pupils in Years 7 to 14, including 160 in its sixth form.
Thomas Bennett Community College offers GCS ...
near the Broadfield Stadium. Opened to the public on 14 November 2005, and officially by Lord Coe
Sebastian Newbold Coe, Baron Coe, (born 29 September 1956), often referred to as Seb Coe, is a British politician and former track and field athlete. As a middle-distance runner, Coe won four Olympic medals, including 1500 metres gold medals ...
on 24 January 2006, the centre includes the only Olympic-sized swimming pool in South East England
South East England is one of the nine official regions of England at the ITL 1 statistical regions of England, first level of International Territorial Level, ITL for Statistics, statistical purposes. It consists of the counties of england, ...
. In March 2008 the centre was named as a training site for the 2012 Olympics in London.
Crawley Development Corporation
Crawley Development Corporation was set up in February 1947 by the Government of the United Kingdom to establish, administer and control the development of the New Town of Crawley in accordance with the New Towns Act 1946. The Corporation had t ...
made little provision for the arts in the plans for the new town, and a proposed arts venue in the town centre was never built. Neighbourhood community centres and the Tilgate Forest Recreational Centre were used for some cultural activities, but it was not until 1988 that the town had a dedicated theatre and arts venue, at the Hawth Theatre
The Hawth Theatre is an arts and entertainment complex located in of woodland about from the town centre of the English town of Crawley. It is wholly owned by Crawley Borough Council and is currently operated by Parkwood Theatres.
History
The ...
. (The name derives from a local corruption of the word "heath
A heath () is a shrubland habitat found mainly on free-draining infertile, acidic soils and characterised by open, low-growing woody vegetation. Moorland is generally related to high-ground heaths with—especially in Great Britain—a cooler ...
", which came to refer specifically to the expanse of wooded land, south of the town centre, in which the theatre was built.) Crawley's earliest cinema, the Imperial Picture House on Brighton Road, lasted from 1909 until the 1940s; the Embassy Cinema on the High Street (opened in 1938) replaced it. A large Cineworld
Cineworld Group plc is a British cinema operator headquartered in London, England. It is the world's second-largest cinema chain (after AMC Theatres), with 9,518 screens across 790 sites in 10 countries: Bulgaria, Czech Republic, Hungary, Irela ...
cinema has since opened in the Crawley Leisure Park, which itself also includes ten-pin bowling
Ten-pin bowling is a type of bowling in which a bowler rolls a bowling ball down a wood or synthetic lane toward ten pins positioned evenly in four rows in an equilateral triangle. The objective is to knock down all ten pins on the first rol ...
, various restaurants and bars and a fitness centre. The Moka nightclub on Station Way opened in October 2012.
Each neighbourhood has self-contained recreational areas, and there are other larger parks throughout the town. The Memorial Gardens, on the eastern side of Queen's Square, feature art displays, children's play areas and lawns, and a plaque commemorating those who died in two Second World War bombing incidents in 1943 and 1944. Goffs Park in Southgate covers , and has lakes, boating ponds, a model railway and many other features. Tilgate Park and Nature Centre has walled gardens, lakes, large areas of woodland with footpaths and bridleways
A bridle path, also bridleway, equestrian trail, horse riding path, ride, bridle road, or horse trail, is a trail or a thoroughfare that is used by people riding on horses. Trails originally created for use by horses often now serve a wider r ...
, a golfing area and a collection of animals and birds.
Heritage
Crawley Museum is based in the town centre. Stone Age and Bronze Age remains discovered in the area are on display, as well as more recent artefacts including parts of Vine Cottage, an old timber-framed building on the High Street which was once home to former ''Punch'' editor Mark Lemon
Mark Lemon (30 November 1809, in London – 23 May 1870, in Crawley) was the founding editor of both ''Punch'' and '' The Field''. He was also a writer of plays and verses.
Biography
Lemon was born in Marylebone, Westminster, Middlesex, ...
and which was demolished when the ASDA development was built.
Crawley has three Grade I listed buildings
In the United Kingdom, a listed building or listed structure is one that has been placed on one of the four statutory lists maintained by Historic England in England, Historic Environment Scotland in Scotland, in Wales, and the Northern Irel ...
( the parish church of St Margaret in Ifield, the parish church of St Nicholas, Worth, and the Friends Meeting House
A Friends meeting house is a meeting house of the Religious Society of Friends (Quakers), where meeting for worship is usually held.
Typically, Friends meeting houses are simple and resemble local residential buildings. Steeples, spires, and ...
in Langley Lane, Ifield), 12 Grade II* listed buildings
In the United Kingdom, a listed building or listed structure is one that has been placed on one of the four statutory lists maintained by Historic England in England, Historic Environment Scotland in Scotland, in Wales, and the Northern Irel ...
and 85 Grade II listed buildings
In the United Kingdom, a listed building or listed structure is one that has been placed on one of the four statutory lists maintained by Historic England in England, Historic Environment Scotland in Scotland, in Wales, and the Northern Irel ...
. The borough council has also awarded locally listed building
In the United Kingdom, a listed building or listed structure is one that has been placed on one of the four statutory lists maintained by Historic England in England, Historic Environment Scotland in Scotland, in Wales, and the Northern Irel ...
status to 58 buildings.
The high street becomes an annual focus of motoring heritage in November as one of the official stops on the London to Brighton Veteran Car Run
The London to Brighton Veteran Car Run is the world's longest-running motoring event, held on a course between London () and Brighton (), England. To qualify, participating cars must have been built before 1905. It is also the world's largest ...
.
Education
Maintained primary and secondary schools were reorganised in 2004 following the Local Education Authority's decision to change the town's three-tier system of first
First or 1st is the ordinal form of the number one (#1).
First or 1st may also refer to:
*World record, specifically the first instance of a particular achievement
Arts and media Music
* 1$T, American rapper, singer-songwriter, DJ, and rec ...
, middle and secondary schools to a more standard primary/secondary divide. Since the restructuring, Crawley has had 17 primary schools (including two Church of England
The Church of England (C of E) is the established Christian church in England and the mother church of the international Anglican Communion. It traces its history to the Christian church recorded as existing in the Roman province of Britain ...
and two Roman Catholic) and four pairs of infant
An infant or baby is the very young offspring of human beings. ''Infant'' (from the Latin word ''infans'', meaning 'unable to speak' or 'speechless') is a formal or specialised synonym for the common term ''baby''. The terms may also be used to ...
and junior School
A Junior school is a type of school which provides primary education to children, often in the age range from 8 and 13, following attendance at Infant school which covers the age range 5–7. (As both Infant and Junior schools are giving Primary ...
s. Most of these were opened in 2004; others changed their status at this date (for example, from a middle to a junior school). Secondary education is provided at one of six secondary schools:
* Ifield Community College
Ifield Community College (ICC) is a maintained comprehensive secondary school in Crawley, England, for pupils aged 11 to 18.
Admissions
It caters for around 1000 pupils in years 7 to 13, including over 100 in its sixth form. It is situated in ...
* Hazelwick School
Hazelwick School is a co-educational comprehensive school with academy status for pupils aged 11 to 18, located in Crawley, West Sussex, England.
History
Hazelwick School was built in 1953 as part of developing Crawley as a new town and wa ...
* Holy Trinity Church of England School
* Oriel High School
Oriel High School is a maintained community secondary school for pupils aged 11 to 18. It opened in September 2004 as part of a reorganisation of secondary education in Crawley, catering for just 370 pupils in years 7 and 8. It was expected t ...
* St Wilfrid's Catholic School
* Thomas Bennett Community College
Thomas Bennett Community College (TBCC) is a secondary school with academy status for pupils aged 11 to 19. It caters to approximately 1200 pupils in Years 7 to 14, including 160 in its sixth form.
Thomas Bennett Community College offers GCS ...
All six of these have a sixth form
In the education systems of England, Northern Ireland, Wales, Jamaica, Trinidad and Tobago and some other Commonwealth countries, sixth form represents the final two years of secondary education, ages 16 to 18. Pupils typically prepare for A-l ...
, the newest opening at Oriel High in September 2008.
There is also a primary / secondary School called The Gatwick School, which is a Free School that opened in 2014. It currently has 4 years, R, 1, 7 and 8. The schools at Ifield and Thomas Bennett are also bases for the Local Authority
Local government is a generic term for the lowest tiers of public administration within a particular sovereign state. This particular usage of the word government refers specifically to a level of administration that is both geographically-loca ...
's adult education
Adult education, distinct from child education, is a practice in which adults engage in systematic and sustained self-educating activities in order to gain new forms of knowledge, skills, attitudes, or values. Merriam, Sharan B. & Brockett, Ralp ...
programmes.
Pupils with special needs
In clinical diagnostic and functional development, special needs (or additional needs) refers to individuals who require assistance for disabilities that may be medical, mental, or psychological. Guidelines for clinical diagnosis are given in b ...
are educated at the two special school
Special education (known as special-needs education, aided education, exceptional education, alternative provision, exceptional student education, special ed., SDC, or SPED) is the practice of educating students in a way that accommodates th ...
s in the town, each of which covers the full spectrum of needs: Manor Green Primary School and Manor Green College.
Desmond Anderson, based in Tilgate
Tilgate is one of 14 neighbourhoods within the town of Crawley in West Sussex, England. The area contains a mixture of privately developed housing, self-build groups and ex-council housing. It is bordered by the districts of Furnace Green to the ...
converted to Academy status in February 2017 and is now part of the University of Brighton Academies Trust. The Atelier 21 Future School for up to 120 pupils aged 4 to 14 years, based in Broadfield House, opened on 24 August 2020.
Further education
Further education (often abbreviated FE) in the United Kingdom and Ireland is education in addition to that received at secondary school, that is distinct from the higher education (HE) offered in universities and other academic institutions. I ...
is provided by Central Sussex College
Crawley College is a college of further education in West Sussex. It offers courses ranging from Sixth form and Adult education to undergraduate courses through partnerships with universities.
History
Crawley College was formed in 2017 after a ...
. Opened in 1958 as Crawley Technical College, it merged with other local colleges to form the new institute in August 2005. The college also provides higher education courses in partnership with the universities at Chichester
Chichester () is a cathedral city and civil parish in West Sussex, England.OS Explorer map 120: Chichester, South Harting and Selsey Scale: 1:25 000. Publisher:Ordnance Survey – Southampton B2 edition. Publishing Date:2009. It is the only ci ...
and Sussex
Sussex (), from the Old English (), is a historic county in South East England that was formerly an independent medieval Anglo-Saxon kingdom. It is bounded to the west by Hampshire, north by Surrey, northeast by Kent, south by the English ...
. In 2004, a proposal was made for an additional campus of the University of Sussex
, mottoeng = Be Still and Know
, established =
, type = Public research university
, endowment = £14.4 million (2020)
, budget = £319.6 million (2019–20)
, chancellor = Sanjeev Bhaskar
, vice_chancellor = Sasha Roseneil
, ...
to be created in Crawley, but as of 2008 no conclusion has been reached.
Media
Crawley has three local newspapers, of which two have a long history in the area. The ''Crawley Observer'' began life in 1881 as ''Simmins Weekly Advertiser'', became the ''Sussex & Surrey Courier'' and then the ''Crawley and District Observer'', and took its current name in 1983. The newspaper is now owned by Johnston Press. The ''Crawley News'' was first published in 1979, and later took over the operations of the older ''Crawley Advertiser'' which closed in 1982. The newspaper was taken over by the Trinity Mirror group in 2015 as part of the purchase of Local World
Local World Holdings Ltd. was a large regional newspaper publisher in the UK that published around 100 print titles and more than 70 websites. It was formed in 2012 by David Montgomery, a former chief executive of Trinity Mirror, to buy the Dai ...
but its last edition was published on 26 October 2016. In September 2008 Johnston Press launched a new weekly broadsheet newspaper called the ''Crawley Times'' based on the companies paper produced in Horsham, the ''West Sussex County Times''.
Crawley is served by the London regional versions of BBC #REDIRECT BBC #REDIRECT BBC
Here i going to introduce about the best teacher of my life b BALAJI sir. He is the precious gift that I got befor 2yrs . How has helped and thought all the concept and made my success in the 10th board exam. ...
...
and
ITV
ITV or iTV may refer to:
ITV
*Independent Television (ITV), a British television network, consisting of:
** ITV (TV network), a free-to-air national commercial television network covering the United Kingdom, the Isle of Man, and the Channel Islan ...
television from the Crystal Palace or Reigate transmitters—although, the town is also served by
BBC South East
BBC South East is the BBC English region serving Kent, East Sussex, most parts of West Sussex and southern parts of Surrey.
The BBC region was created in September 2001 by the joining of the Heathfield transmitter (formerly part of the BBC ...
&
ITV Meridian
ITV Meridian (previously Meridian Broadcasting) is the holder of the ITV franchise for the South and South East of England. The station was launched at 12:00 am on 1 January 1993, replacing previous broadcaster Television South, and is owned ...
on
Freesat
Freesat is a British free-to-air satellite television service, first formed as a joint venture between the BBC and ITV plc and now owned by Digital UK. The service was formed as a memorandum in 2007 and has been marketed since 6 May 2008. Free ...
. This means the town is served by news and television programs from London and Tunbridge Wells.
Radio Mercury began broadcasting on 20 October 1984 from
Broadfield House in Broadfield.
The station, now owned by
Global Radio, broadcasts as
Heart South
Heart South is a regional radio station owned and operated by Global as part of the Heart network. It broadcasts to the south and south east of England from studios in Fareham, Hampshire.
The station launched on 3 June 2019 as a result of a me ...
from Brighton, with the studios in Kelvin Way in Crawley closed in August 2010.
On 1 February 2011, the local
Gold
Gold is a chemical element with the symbol Au (from la, aurum) and atomic number 79. This makes it one of the higher atomic number elements that occur naturally. It is a bright, slightly orange-yellow, dense, soft, malleable, and ductile met ...
transmitter on 1521 AM closed and listeners were advised to retune to 1548 AM (Gold London) or 1323 AM (Gold Sussex).
Local BBC radio was provided by BBC Radio Sussex from 1983; this became part of
BBC Southern Counties Radio
BBC Southern Counties Radio was a BBC Local Radio service for the English counties of Surrey and Sussex. The station also covered a large part of north-east Hampshire. It was the first BBC local radio station to introduce an all-speech format. ...
following a merger with
BBC Radio Surrey
BBC Radio Surrey is the BBC's local radio station serving Surrey, north-east Hampshire and north West Sussex (including Gatwick Airport). It broadcasts on FM, DAB, digital TV and via BBC Sounds from studios at the University of Surrey in Guil ...
in 1994.
From March 2009, BBC Southern Counties Radio became
BBC Sussex
BBC Radio Sussex is the BBC's local radio station serving the counties of East and West Sussex.
It broadcasts on FM, DAB, digital TV and via BBC Sounds from studios on Queens Road in Brighton.
Programming
Local programming airs from the BB ...
on 104.5FM &
BBC Surrey
BBC Radio Surrey is the BBC's local radio station serving Surrey, north-east Hampshire and north West Sussex (including Gatwick Airport). It broadcasts on FM, DAB, digital TV and via BBC Sounds from studios at the University of Surrey in Guil ...
on 104FM. Due to the positioning of their transmitters, when broadcasting separately both stations cover Crawley stories.
Twin town
:
Eisenhüttenstadt
Eisenhüttenstadt (literally "ironworks city" in German; , dsb, Pśibrjog) is a town in the Oder-Spree district of the state of Brandenburg, Germany, on the border with Poland. East Germany founded the city in 1950. It was known as Stalinstadt ( ...
, German Democratic Republic, 1963–1968
:
Dorsten
Dorsten (; Westphalian: ''Dössen'') is a town in the district of Recklinghausen in North Rhine-Westphalia, Germany and has a population of about 75,000.
Dorsten is situated on the western rim of Westphalia bordering the Rhineland. Its histor ...
, Germany, since 1973
:, Alytus
Notable people and music groups
File:Erin Doherty in 2020.png, Erin Doherty
Erin Rachael Doherty (born 16 July 1992) is a British actress. She played the young Princess Anne in the third and fourth seasons of the Netflix drama ''The Crown'', and Becky in the BBC/Amazon Prime drama ''Chloe'' (2022).
Early life and ed ...
File:Ms Dynamite (4663812211).jpg, Ms. Dynamite
Niomi Arleen McLean-Daley (born 26 April 1981), better known as Ms. Dynamite, is a British singer and rapper. She is the recipient of the Mercury Music Prize, two Brit Awards and three MOBO Awards.
Early years
She was born Niomi Arleen Mc ...
File:Romesh Ranganathan in 2013 (cropped).jpg, Romesh Ranganathan
Jonathan Romesh Ranganathan (born 27 March 1978), is an English actor and comedian. He is known for his deadpan and often self-deprecating comedy.
Ranganathan has made numerous appearances on television comedy panel shows, and in 2016 he co-p ...
File:ENG-PAN (22) 2018-6-69 Gareth Southgate.jpg, Gareth Southgate
Gareth Southgate (born 3 September 1970) is an English professional football manager and former player who played as a defender and midfielder. He has been the manager of the England national team since 2016.
Southgate won the League Cup ...
File:Daley_Thomson_2007_cropped.jpg, Daley Thompson
Francis Morgan Ayodélé Thompson, (born 30 July 1958), better known as Daley Thompson, is a British former decathlete. He won the decathlon gold medal at the Olympic Games in 1980 and 1984, and broke the world record for the event four tim ...
File:Alan Minter in 2005.png, Alan Minter
File:Bethan Leadley 2017 festival.png, Leadley
Bethan Mary Leadley (born 15 December 1995) is an English singer-songwriter, YouTuber, presenter, and actress.
Early life and education
Leadley was born in Crawley, West Sussex. She has an older brother, Daniel, who is married to Hannah Witton. ...
File:Laura Moffatt 2006-03-06.jpg, Laura Moffatt
Laura Jean Moffatt (''née'' Field; born 9 April 1954) is a British Labour Party politician who was the Member of Parliament (MP) for Crawley from 1997 until 2010.
Early life
Born Laura Jean Field in London in 1954, she was educated at Hazelw ...
File:Robert Smith (musician) crop.jpg, Robert Smith
*
Akala (Kingslee James McLean Daley), British rapper voted the Best Hip Hop Act at the MOBO Awards 2006
*Sir Charles Court, the 21st Premier of Western Australia, was born in Crawley, but migrated to Australia with his family before his first birthday.
*
Erin Doherty
Erin Rachael Doherty (born 16 July 1992) is a British actress. She played the young Princess Anne in the third and fourth seasons of the Netflix drama ''The Crown'', and Becky in the BBC/Amazon Prime drama ''Chloe'' (2022).
Early life and ed ...
, actress, known for roles in ''Call the Midwife'' (2017), ''Les Misérables (2019 TV series), Les Misérables'' (2018) as Princess Anne in ''The Crown (TV series), The Crown'' (2019), ''Chloe (TV series), Chloe'' (2022)
*
Ms. Dynamite
Niomi Arleen McLean-Daley (born 26 April 1981), better known as Ms. Dynamite, is a British singer and rapper. She is the recipient of the Mercury Music Prize, two Brit Awards and three MOBO Awards.
Early years
She was born Niomi Arleen Mc ...
(Niomi Arleen McLean-Daley, MBE), British rapper, singer, songwriter, record producer, recipient of the Mercury Music Prize and 2 Brit Awards.
*John George Haigh, the "Acid Bath Murderer", carried out some of his murders at a workshop in the West Green area.
*Caroline Haslett, electrical pioneer, engineer and champion of women's rights.
*
Leadley
Bethan Mary Leadley (born 15 December 1995) is an English singer-songwriter, YouTuber, presenter, and actress.
Early life and education
Leadley was born in Crawley, West Sussex. She has an older brother, Daniel, who is married to Hannah Witton. ...
(Bethan Mary Leadley), singer-songwriter, music television presenter for 4Music and youtuber.
*
Mark Lemon
Mark Lemon (30 November 1809, in London – 23 May 1870, in Crawley) was the founding editor of both ''Punch'' and '' The Field''. He was also a writer of plays and verses.
Biography
Lemon was born in Marylebone, Westminster, Middlesex, ...
, first editor of Punch magazine, ''Punch'', lived on the High Street from 1858 until his death in 1870. Commemorated by a blue plaque outside the
George Hotel.
*Jordan Maguire-Drew, professional footballer for Grimsby Town, born in Crawley and played for
Oakwood F.C.
Oakwood Football Club are a football club based in Crawley, England. They were established in 1962 and joined the Sussex County League Division Three in 1984. In 2005–06 season, they were champions of the Sussex County League Division Two ...
before joining Brighton and Hove Albion.
*
Alan Minter, boxer won bronze at the 1972 Summer Olympics, 1972 Munich Olympic Games at light middleweight and in 1980 became the undisputed world middleweight champion.
*Ross Minter, boxer was British Boxing Board of Control English Welterweight boxing champion 2005.
*
Laura Moffatt
Laura Jean Moffatt (''née'' Field; born 9 April 1954) is a British Labour Party politician who was the Member of Parliament (MP) for Crawley from 1997 until 2010.
Early life
Born Laura Jean Field in London in 1954, she was educated at Hazelw ...
, British Labour Party politician who was the Member of Parliament (MP) for Crawley from 1997 until 2010.
*Kevin Muscat, a footballer who has played for Australia since 1994 and had a nine-year spell in Britain, playing for four different clubs, was born in the town.
*Natasha Pyne, actress, known for ''The Taming of the Shrew (1967 film), The Taming of the Shrew'' (1967), ''The Breaking of Bumbo'' (1970) and ''Father, Dear Father (film), Father, Dear Father'' (1973).
*
Romesh Ranganathan
Jonathan Romesh Ranganathan (born 27 March 1978), is an English actor and comedian. He is known for his deadpan and often self-deprecating comedy.
Ranganathan has made numerous appearances on television comedy panel shows, and in 2016 he co-p ...
, comedian and television personality, was a maths teacher at
Hazelwick School
Hazelwick School is a co-educational comprehensive school with academy status for pupils aged 11 to 18, located in Crawley, West Sussex, England.
History
Hazelwick School was built in 1953 as part of developing Crawley as a new town and wa ...
and lives in the town.
*Grace Saif, actress, known for ''Doctors (2000 TV series), Doctors'' (2000) and the Netflix show ''13 Reasons Why''.
*
Gareth Southgate
Gareth Southgate (born 3 September 1970) is an English professional football manager and former player who played as a defender and midfielder. He has been the manager of the England national team since 2016.
Southgate won the League Cup ...
OBE, England national football team manager, England manager (from 2016), former England national football team, England football player, attended Pound Hill Junior School and
Hazelwick School
Hazelwick School is a co-educational comprehensive school with academy status for pupils aged 11 to 18, located in Crawley, West Sussex, England.
History
Hazelwick School was built in 1953 as part of developing Crawley as a new town and wa ...
.
*
Daley Thompson
Francis Morgan Ayodélé Thompson, (born 30 July 1958), better known as Daley Thompson, is a British former decathlete. He won the decathlon gold medal at the Olympic Games in 1980 and 1984, and broke the world record for the event four tim ...
CBE, athlete, winner of 2 Decathlon Olympic gold medals, trained in Crawley for the Olympics in 1980 Summer Olympics, 1980 and 1984 Summer Olympics, 1984.
*Theresa Tomlinson (born 1946), writer for children and young adults, was born in Crawley.
*Peter Vaughan, actor, ''Straw Dogs (1971 film), Straw Dogs'' (1971), Grouty in ''Porridge (TV series), Porridge'' (1979) and Maester Aemon Targaryen in ''Game of Thrones'' (2011–2015).
*Dan Walker (broadcaster), Dan Walker, BBC breakfast presenter, former sports presenter, born and raised in Crawley.
*The Cure were formed in Crawley in 1976 by
Robert Smith, Michael Dempsey and Lol Tolhurst, all of whom attended St Wilfrid's RC School.
*The Feeling's drummer Paul Stewart (musician), Paul Stewart, guitarist Kevin Jeremiah and keyboard player Ciaran Jeremiah were also at St Wilfrid's.
*Brett Marvin and the Thunderbolts were formed in Crawley in 1968 at the Thomas Bennett School.
*2-D (character), 2-D, fictional musician, lead vocalist and keyboardist of Gorillaz
See also
* List of places of worship in Crawley
* Urban planning
*
West Sussex
West Sussex is a county in South East England on the English Channel coast. The ceremonial county comprises the shire districts of Adur, Arun, Chichester, Horsham, and Mid Sussex, and the boroughs of Crawley and Worthing. Covering an ...
* St. Nicholas' Church, Worth, Worth Church
* City Place Gatwick
References
Bibliography
*
*
*
*
*
*
*
*
*
*
*
*
*
*
External links
Crawley Borough Council
{{authority control
Crawley,
Towns in West Sussex
New towns in England
Non-metropolitan districts of West Sussex
Populated places established in the 5th century
New towns started in the 1940s
Unparished areas in West Sussex
Boroughs in England