Dyffryn Clydach is a

community A community is a social unit (a group of living things) with commonality such as place, norms, religion, values, customs, or identity. Communities may share a sense of place situated in a given geographical area (e.g. a country, village, tow ...

Neath Port Talbot Neath Port Talbot ( cy, Castell-nedd Port Talbot) is a Local government in Wales#Principal areas, county borough in the South West Wales, south-west of Wales. Its principal towns are Neath, Port Talbot, Briton Ferry and Pontardawe. The county bor ...

county borough County borough is a term introduced in 1889 in the United Kingdom of Great Britain and Ireland, to refer to a borough or a city independent of county council control, similar to the unitary authorities created since the 1990s. An equivalent ter ...

Wales Wales ( cy, Cymru ) is a Countries of the United Kingdom, country that is part of the United Kingdom. It is bordered by England to the Wales–England border, east, the Irish Sea to the north and west, the Celtic Sea to the south west and the ...

, between

Neath Neath (; cy, Castell-nedd) is a market town and Community (Wales), community situated in the Neath Port Talbot, Neath Port Talbot County Borough, Wales. The town had a population of 50,658 in 2011. The community of the parish of Neath had a po ...

and

Swansea Swansea (; cy, Abertawe ) is a coastal city and the second-largest city of Wales. It forms a principal area, officially known as the City and County of Swansea ( cy, links=no, Dinas a Sir Abertawe). The city is the twenty-fifth largest in ...

Description

Dyffryn Clydach includes the residential communities of

Cwrt Herbert Cwrt Herbert, also sometimes called Court Herbert, is a small community to the east of Neath Abbey in south Wales It developed as a mining village servicing the Cwrt Herbert Colliery in the mid 19th century The colliery closed in 1929 and the vil ...

, Dyffryn, Highlands, Longford, Neath Abbey, and Penshannel. Although covering only , the area is packed with history, including the ruins of

Neath Abbey Neath Abbey ( cy, Abaty Nedd) was a Cistercian monastery, located near the present-day town of Neath in South Wales, UK. It was once the largest abbey in Wales. Substantial ruins can still be seen, and are in the care of Cadw. Tudor historian ...

. The current Tesco store is believed to occupy the site of an 11th-century castle. The more central and northerly parts of the ward are mostly rural, consisting of picturesque farmland and woodland encircling the western base of Mount Drummau. The Clydach Brook flows through Dyffryn Clydach in a north to south direction, passing

. The woodland surrounding the river forms a public park.

Amenities

There is a

business park A business park or office park is a designated area of land in which many office buildings are grouped together. These types of developments are often located in suburban areas where land and building costs are more affordable, and are typically ...

to the south of the community area with a junction onto the

A465 The A465 is a trunk road that runs from Bromyard in Herefordshire, England to Llandarcy near Swansea in South Wales. The western half is known officially as the Neath to Abergavenny Trunk Road, but the section from Abergavenny to the Vale of N ...

trunk road which, heading east, joins the

M4 Motorway The M4, originally the London-South Wales Motorway, is a motorway in the United Kingdom running from west London to southwest Wales. The English section to the Severn Bridge was constructed between 1961 and 1971; the Welsh element was largely ...

at Junction 43, less than five minutes away. There are three local schools: Neath Abbey

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 Early Years School, Mynachlog Nedd Juniors, and Dwr Y Felin Lower School. Near the business park are located the ruins of the

Cistercian The Cistercians, () officially the Order of Cistercians ( la, (Sacer) Ordo Cisterciensis, abbreviated as OCist or SOCist), are a Catholic religious order of monks and nuns that branched off from the Benedictines and follow the Rule of Saint ...

monastery A monastery is a building or complex of buildings comprising the domestic quarters and workplaces of monastics, monks or nuns, whether living in communities or alone (hermits). A monastery generally includes a place reserved for prayer which ...

of Mynachlog Nedd, the Tennant

Canal Canals or artificial waterways are waterways or engineered channels built for drainage management (e.g. flood control and irrigation) or for conveyancing water transport vehicles (e.g. water taxi). They carry free, calm surface flow un ...

, and Neath Abbey

Ironworks An ironworks or iron works is an industrial plant where iron is smelted and where heavy iron and steel products are made. The term is both singular and plural, i.e. the singular of ''ironworks'' is ''ironworks''. Ironworks succeeded bloomeri ...

. There is much

woodland A woodland () is, in the broad sense, land covered with trees, or in a narrow sense, synonymous with wood (or in the U.S., the ''plurale tantum'' woods), a low-density forest forming open habitats with plenty of sunlight and limited shade (see ...

in the area with footpaths maintained by the community council. Longford Memorial Hall is a recently refurbished community centre and

village hall A village hall is a public building in a village used for various things such as: United Kingdom In the United Kingdom, a village hall is usually a building which contains at least one large room (plus kitchen and toilets), is owned by a local ...

and has two committee rooms. There is also a community centre at Cwrt Herbert.

Governance

Dyffryn Clydach is in the parliamentary constituency of

. It is coterminous with the Dyffryn

electoral ward A ward is a local authority area, typically used for electoral purposes. In some countries, wards are usually named after neighbourhoods, thoroughfares, parishes, landmarks, geographical features and in some cases historical figures connected to t ...

, which is bounded to the north by Allt-Wen ward; to the east by

Bryncoch North Bryncoch North is an electoral ward of Neath Port Talbot county borough, Wales forming part of the parish A parish is a territorial entity in many Christian denominations, constituting a division within a diocese. A parish is under the past ...

and

Bryncoch South Bryncoch South is an electoral ward of Neath Port Talbot county borough, Wales forming part of the parish of Blaenhonddan. The ward elects two county councillors to Neath Port Talbot County Borough Council. Bryncoch South covers some or all of ...

; to the south by Neath East; to the southwest by

Coedffranc North Coedffranc North is an electoral ward of Neath Port Talbot county borough, Wales. is a part of the Coedffranc community and falls within the parliamentary constituency of Aberavon. Coedffranc North is bounded by the wards of Dyffryn to the nor ...

and Coedffranc Central; and to the west by the wards of Llansamlet and Clydach (both in

). Dyffryn ward elects a county councillor to

Neath Port Talbot County Borough Council Neath Port Talbot County Borough Council is the local authority for the county borough of Neath Port Talbot, one of the 22 principal areas of Wales. The council was controlled by the Labour Party from its creation in 1996 until 2022, when Plaid ...

. Dyffryn Clydach has its own

community council A community council is a public representative body in Great Britain. In England they may be statutory parish councils by another name, under the Local Government and Public Involvement in Health Act 2007, or they may be non-statutory bodies. In ...

, made up of thirteen councillors. In the May 2017 Neath Port Talbot County Borough Council election the results were:

Notable people

* Howell Moore-Gwyn (1886–1956), first-class cricketer and British Army officer

References

External links

The community of Dyffryn ClydachDyffryn Clydach Community Council
{{Neath Port Talbot communities Communities in Neath Port Talbot