10 reasons to love Swindon: a northerner’s perspective
To be fair I could easily have called this post ’10 reason’s to love Swindon: another northerner’s perspective. What with hailing from a northern direction myself.
An earlier guest post from Brian Carter about how multicultural Swindon is, noted the situational irony of this particular northerner recognising all that was wonderful about Swindon.
However this guest post from Cheryl Tanner, is another example of someone from another part of the country pitching up in this town and asking ‘Why?’ As in ‘why does this town get so much flak?’ Indeed countless are the times I’ve chatted to many incomers to Swindon who ask that very same question. It’s always mystified me as much as it’s mystified Cheryl and all the other people I’ve come across.
Indeed on that note, my friend and fellow business owner Sandra Trusty, owner of Fabulous Functions UK, told me that she too experienced that same negativity from others when she was moving to Swindon but has been delighted by the place, its people and the staggering amount of green spaces we have here.
10 reasons to love Swindon: a northerner’s perspective
Anyway – to the point. Here in her own words, are what the author likes about Swindon – a very insightful young lady I must say. Welcome to Swindon Cheryl.
“I moved to Swindon a year and a half ago for a new job and I can honestly say me and my husband are really happy here and don’t want to leave anytime soon.
We didn’t quite know what to expect when we moved here, because the motivation for moving was a new job and finding out about the town was a bit of an after thought. Between us we’ve lived in quite a few places and we’ve got used to moving somewhere new and finding out about it as we go so – you can say we were quite relaxed about the whole thing.
However when we told people where we were going, the most a lot of people could say about Swindon was “The magic roundabout”, “wasn’t that where The Office was based?” and ” oh, could you not find a job in London then?” So we were pleasantly surprised by what we found when we came here and can honestly say that Swindon’s got a lot going for it.
Here I’ve listed 10 of the reasons why I love Swindon:
1) A lot of big organisations are based here, so a greater variety of jobs
Compared to where I’ve lived before, Swindon has a variety of jobs going and not just in the retail sector. I moved here for a good job in the Civil Service, based in the centre of Swindon and there were a number of other Government bodies based in the same building.
Swindon has head offices and large offices for a lot of other national firms here too in a number of sectors, which just goes to show you don’t have to live in London to get a decent job. Speaking of London…
Close to the capital and the south-west
2) It’s only an hour’s train journey to London
It seems amazing to me that housing and rent prices aren’t a lot higher then they are as you are only an hour’s train ride from the capital. It’s an easy distance for a day trip and the trains run frequently. Yeah there are delays, but you will get that just about everywhere. But before I start kicking off about trains, let’s move on…
3) Independent shops and restaurants
I was surprised by the amount of independent businesses you have for a town this size and it’s really refreshing to see. There are all the restaurants and bars up in old town, the shops in the tented market, the unique shops opening on the main high street and the ones already in the Brunel centre to name a few. It just adds a nice bit of variety and character to the town.
4) The weather is better here (she’s right – it’s a top coat warmer)
This is more of a general comment for the south of England but the weather is better here. When you move from one place where it seems to rain most of the time you really notice the difference.
Great countryside in and around Swindon
5) You’re a short drive to countryside and historic sites
You don’t have to travel very far before you hit fields, big open parks, castles and historic walks. Plus there are a number of buses to popular sites which is great for non-drivers.
6) You’re close to a number of city breaks and trips
Even if you don’t like Swindon you are very close to a number of popular city breaks and trips like Bath, Bristol, Salisbury, Cheltenham and Oxford to name just a few. Not to mention skipping London airports and using Bristol airport instead – saves on the train fare and there is a bus straight to the airport from Bristol Temple Meads.
7) Investment and development
Since we’ve moved here there have been improvements made like the new Regent Circus development and all the new housing being built and renovated by the retail outlet and in the town centre.
8) Retail outlet which is walking distance from town
This is a big plus. There was a McArthur Glen outlet near Chester but you normally needed to drive or get the bus and would take most of the day to go around and travel to and from it. But here you can just wander over after work or for part of a Saturday.
9) Nice area to live
It’s unavoidable that every city or town has areas which aren’t as nice as others and since moving we’ve heard about the areas which are meant to be rough. But to be honest, the parts of Swindon we’ve seen aren’t that bad at all. I feel safe walking alone when its dark and generally it looks nice. Not exactly a critical analysis of the complicated elements of city planning I know. But security, feeling safe and being able to walk where I need to go is what’s important to me.
Plenty to do
10) Activities like ice hockey, zorbing, comedy clubs, theatres , museums, gin tasting nights and more!
I remember before we had even moved here, I had booked two tickets to go see the Swindon Wildcats.
My husband had always wanted to see an Ice hockey game. I hadn’t realised it was popular in the UK let alone here. Again, we didn’t know what to expect and I thought it would be quite a small match with a small audience. But the atmosphere was amazing and they really do well with the lights and music to make it feel like an event. Plus the Swindon team is brilliant so it gives you something to cheer for! There‘s a whole host of things to do here and I‘ve no where near covered it all. But it helped us settle in.
This is probably listing things many resident Swindonians already know. It’s sometimes hard to get excited about a place you’ve lived in for a long time. I feel the same about some of my previous homes. But you’ve got a lot to be proud of and to us it already feels like home.”
