More about the Guildford Area
Guildford is a popular large town, (officially not a city, despite the cathedral) with excellent transport links to London, the South coast and the motorway network. There is a fine balance between the rural settings one can escape to within minutes and the busy town centre and business parks.
The cobbled High Street is host to numerous shops, department stores and restaurants, and the recently renovated Friary Shopping Centre has many famous brands. We even have a Waitrose now, so you know it must be good place to live!
The town has become the official “county town” for Surrey, and is often listed in the top 10 of “best places to live” that newspapers love to fill their pages with.
Local amenities
The University of Surrey opened a world class state of the art sports facility during 2010 which is open to public and used for training by Olympic athletes and Harlequin Rugby Club. Currently there are numerous leisure centres in the local area in Cranleigh, Godalming, and Guildford.
The Spectrum in Guildford is the largest of these and is host to a local ice hockey team competing in the country’s premier league. This is located opposite a main park area Stoke Park which is used by many local rugby and football clubs. The local cricket team play in the Surrey Championship Premier division and most years host a first class county game at their ground.
Guildford has a 2 theatres in the town centre and a large multiplex cinema. There are many restaurants in and around the towns, covering all tastes.
The borough is within the Surrey hills (area of natural beauty) on the North Downs which encourages walking tourists. The main supermarkets are Waitrose in the town centre, an out of town Tesco’s near the university and research park, plus a Sainsbury’s in Burpham to the north of the town.
Nearby, about 3-4 miles away, Godalming hosts a Waitrose and a Sainsbury’s, and Cranleigh hosts a Sainsbury’s. The local schools throughout the borough are of a high standard which does create a desire for many residents to move into specific catchment areas.
Transport
Guildford is within 45mins drive of Heathrow and Gatwick airport. Guildford has 2 train stations, the larger has a direct train link to Gatwick, Reading, Portsmouth and London (via Woking).Travelling time to each of these destinations is 35-45 minutes by train. The second Guildford train station (London Road) serves London. Trains to these main destinations run very frequently, at non peak they still run every 30 minutes.
The A3 and A31 both run into the town centre, and are 1.5 from Godalming giving good access to London, The South Coast and the South East Motorway Network, (M25 is 20 minutes driving, M3 30minutes, M4 40minutes).
National Express run services to London and Portsmouth. There are park and ride schemes from the leisure centre Spectrum, Artington (Godalming road) and Merrow. The river Wey navigation runs from Godalming to Weybridge and is more a tourist feature than genuine transport, however it offers good cycle and pedestrian access between Guildford and Godalming.