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Me and my partner are looking to relocate to somewhere South of Nottingham but North of Oxford with strong transport links to Birmingham/London. We'll be renting, like to be outdoors and prefer to be close to if not in a reasonably sized town for pubs and restaurants.
We're heading down this weekend to scope out Nottingham and the Rugby area, where would you recommend we add to the ‘must visit’ list?
I’ve had to quit my job (Engineering / Manufacturing Project Management contract work if anyone’s hiring…) to make this happen in support of my partner so the more riding terrain the better!
Thanks
Bit of advice... Stay away from Rugby! Seriously...
Most MTBing is going to be west and north of Brum, so looking to the east isn't going to help in that respect.
I'd personally give Nottingham a miss as there are lots of rough areas around there. Rugby itself is a bit small and tired but there are lots of nice small villages around that area, close to Leamington Spa or Stratford which are both large and have lots of pubs and restaurants. Some of the outlying little villages are great value. Lots of engineering jobs in the area too!
Sutton Coldfield isn't bad either, and close to Cannock Chase
Derby or Stoke. Seriously. great mtbing nearby for both cities and great rail connections. Plus both are cheap for renting and buying.
Leamington is nice. I live there but it's not the greatest for riding, but then nowhere is in the Midlands. It's got good access to transport links, lots of nice pubs, about four bike shops, weekly organised bike rides at one shop etc. Could be worse..
You could look at Stourbridge, 30 minutes from Birmingham by train plus direct line into London Marylebone. Plenty of local riding at Clent and Kinver plus the Wyre forest and an hour in the car will take you to Cannock, Church Stretton or Ludlow (for Mortimer forest).
It's where I've lived for the past 25 years and it's always seemed a good compromise between access to riding and access to facilities.
I'm from just South of Leicester.
I wouldnt move locally again. I think Leicester is rapidly going downhill. Local villages are quite nice, but expensive.
I've been working in Rugby recently. Workwise, it is booming there, lots of railway companies locally who are doing well, and will be for 15+ years once HS2 starts.
Somewhere just outside Rugby would be my choice at the moment, Clifton is small but nice.
Dunchurch is nice.
How about Warwick, or Leamington. Both nice but quite expensive.
Derby over Nottingham. Transport links better. Riding better. Nottingham better if you are younger or cooler. We settled near Ilkeston when we moved up, between the two but closer to Derby.
Great places around Stoke, but it is a very poor area. The people are lovely, I could happily live around there, just not there. Newcastle u der Lyme is the nicer town there.
Another vote for Stourbridge. We have loads of good riding on our doorstep and loads more not far away in the car.
Lichfield is nice for bars and restaurants, about 20-30 mins drive from Cannock chase trails, rideable distance to the edge of the chase itself if you're after more natural stuff. Train links to Brum for bigger shopping trips, good motorway links for the rest of the country.
If you're looking for work in manufacturing have you thought about the car companies?
Where's your other half going to be working?
Rent somewhere within half an hour's walk of there. Fifteen minutes would be preferable, mind.
Definetly look at Nottingham. The past five years has seen massive amounts of regeneration.
It even has its own version of the oyster card for use with the tram,train and buses.
It's an hour to the Peak District or the likes of Cannock, access to the A1 and M1 is very good. Shopping and restaurants are of good quality.
The likes of Derby and Ilkeston are miles behind in terms of growth.
Look at places like West Bridgeford for the South of Notta. Beeston for being more Central and areas such as Calverton for the North.
Midlifecrashes - She's a consultant of sorts so is based from home and travels widely - thus the need to be near good transport links, otherwise we're largely free to pick where we want to be.
Thanks to all for the advice so far, we're planning our route for this weekend around some of your comments.
Friend of mine relocated to Gloucestershire, he drives to Birningham 3-4 days a week (1hr) or to Swindon (I think) 1-2 days a week in order to take train to London, I can find out more if you wish
I can't say I've ever been to Nottingham but afaik its the gun crime/murder capital of the UK
Another vote for around Lichfield area. My parents live in a village just outside Lichfield, plently of nice pubs and bars, good community feel. Small amounts of local MTB and 20 mins to Cannock chase, 1:30 to FOD or Llandegla etc. Spades of road riding from the door. Direct train from Lichfield City to Birmingham New Street in 40 mins and London Direct from Lichfield TV in 1:40!
Somewhere like Whittington could work well!
Avoid Nuneaton area like the plague and Rugby whilst plenty of work opportunities is relatively devoid of any decent riding, the same as Nuneaton.
If I had the choice I would try and get to the Shropshire side of Birmingham that way giving you a bigger choice of good closeish riding destinations.
Unless you like relatively flat, gerorfmy land, clay based featureless riding......in which case welcome to Nuneaton 😆
Another +1 for Stourbridge, lived here all my life on and off. Decent local riding in Clent and kinver, with wyre forest an option when it's not a mud fest. Then you've got cannock in about 40 minutes, hop ton in an hour, ribbesford in half an hour, degla or coed y brenan in 2 and a half hours and so on!
As for the town, some nice areas, some less so, but generally a nice place to live, decent pubs and restaurants, decent shops, a couple of good lbs's!
Oh and good rail link as mentioned earlier, I do a fair bit of work in London so catching a direct train is great, or can be on the m5 in about 20 mins if you prefer to drive.
The likes of Derby and Ilkeston are miles behind in terms of growth.
And much nicer/better value because of it.
Stourbridge/Wollaston area west of brum has a lot going for it.
Some very outdated and ill informed views on nottingham here! The gun crime things long gone (mainly media generated in first place).. its by far the most vibrant city of the big 3 in the area, theres a huge range of restaurants/bars, with lots of firsts outside of london, good beers, varied music scene, amazing creative/arts scene, big planned investment in cycling, decent local cycle scene (criticla mass is thriving), good transport in/out of centre if you choose not to drive, local bike hire scheme, an hour from peaks, cannock, sheff, ambergate, pines plus some local secret riding thats seriously progressive.
I've just bought in a village on the northern edge of the city, commute into town on singletrack for 50%..love it, never had to dodge stray rounds or shoot my way out of the local, would recommend.
Stourbridge is a good call. Got a mate who lives in Nottingham - really nice place in West Bridgford. I'd avoid Warwick - only because great riding isn't that accessible IMHO. Lichfield is also good as is Malvern. Malvern is about 1 hr by train into Brum and not far off M5.
Nottingham City itself is a bit strange - the city is a bit of a chequerboard of nice and ropey areas interspersed. The traffic in the city is pretty grim, but the trams and public transport are very good. The crime thing is blown out of proportion a bit. Outside of the Nottingham city, you've got a few really nice areas.
West Bridgford / Radcliffe on trent / Bingham side of town - Bridgford is very nice with it's own little town centre, property is very expensive, the further you go out to the east the more rural it gets. Road riding out through the villages on that side of town is pleasant but not very hilly. You've got decent access to the A46 and A52, and the A453 has just been upgraded so hopefully getting out to the west isn't the massive pain it used to be.
Mapperley top / Calverton side of town. The further north / east you go the more villagey it gets. You do have to go through some interesting areas to get to Mapperley from the town centre. You can get onto the A614 pretty easily to head north, but it's not very easy to get south as you either need to go around town or over Gunthorpe bridge which is a bit of a bottleneck.
The villages between Nottingham and Derby. Good access to the M1 and therefore the M42, puts you in a commutable distance of Derby, Nottingham, Leicester, and Sheffield / Doncaster at a push. Some villages are really nice, some are very expensive. The further North you get the more you get into ex industrial / mining areas, and property gets cheaper.
If you have any intention of going to the shops, gigs or restaurants, or anything else you would want to do in a city, then Nottingham is the place you'll be heading into. Derby seems like a wasteland in comparison.
Villages around Leicester are nice, but I wouldn't want to live in the city.
Wow, Stourbridge getting some love and rightly so. Good riding close by, nice town and very good transport links.
Otherwise, look at Brum outskirts, Harbourne and Mosely are close to the city and have good transport. You can also get to the hill easily enough. Neither are cheap though.
Leam and Warwick are nice towns but no riding close by apart from some very dull paths around fields.
Solihull is a lovely but bloody expensive town. Very little interesting riding either.
I wouldn't live within Nottingham or within Derby. Unless you like city living, and even then Nottingham is not really a proper city, it tries hard, has big aspirations, talks a good game, but it's a bit rough and not even close to being in the same league as Manchester, Leeds, Birmingham etc. It's more of a bigger version of Derby, which is really just a small town. There is alot of investment going on in Derby too. It's small and quaint, which for me is a good thing, it's grown on me a little since I moved here 20 years ago, but it's not for everyone.
If you're remotely an outdoorsy type and like your biking then you're better off towards the Derby side and North of Derby if you don't want to drive to your ride sites. I moved south of Derby, it's nice enough but i'm about 20 mins drive away from where I do most of my riding north of Derby.
From Derby you can be in London in a little over an hour if you choose the right train. You're about 40 mins train and drive from Birmingham and you're about an hour away from Birmingham Airport and Manchester Airport and you have East Midlands Airport on your doorstep, so no need to use the hellish airports of the SE, unless you're going somewhere obscure. Also from Derby you have close access to the A50 and A38 which means you can be on the M1 or the M6 within about 20 minutes.
So take a good look at Derbyshire, Nottinghamshire and Leicestershire. There are some lovely little villages in those counties. And its a bit of a hotbed for independent breweries - I would no longer contemplate living somewhere where I was not within comfortable walking distance form a decent local pub that sells a good range of decent beers.
somewhere South of Nottingham but North of Oxford with strong transport links to Birmingham/London
Milton Keynes. 30 mins to London, 45 to Brum. Great riding at Woburn, lots of good roadie stuff too. Huge parks. Loads of pubs, restaurants etc. Plenty of work. We're never moving out.
If you don't fancy being in the city itself, loads of nice villages nearby (Woburn Sands etc). But then you lose the high speed train links.
Stafford? Fast trains direct to Birmingham and London, within riding distance of Cannock Chase next to the M6 for heading northwards or southwards, close to the M54 for heading Wales-wards.
We live not that far away and have occasionally wondered about moving there.
Lichfield is a bit more lively, but there's more riding from Stafford...
Solihull is nice enough and certainly the transport links can't be beaten. Rail, road, and air, to anywhere in the country.
Riding leaves a bit to be desired on the mtb front, but Cannock is near enough, and straight out into the Warwickshire countryside for roadying.
Shops, bars, etc are all decent, as are schools.
Stourbridge/Wollaston area west of brum has a lot going for it.
Some great pubs too
Once again, thank you to all contributors,
We called at Market Harborough, Leamington Spa, Warwick, Stratford, Worcester, South Birmingham (Bourneville area), Solihull, Derby, Nottingham and Litchfield.
I won’t bore you with what we thought of each but for our own reasons we liked Warwick / Leamington as it mixed reasonable outdoor space, what appeared to be strong community/pubs/clubs (sporting) with good transport links.
Needless to say we can’t afford to rent in the town itself so need to consider an outlying village or similar, can anyone make a suggestion, the limiting factor is that we’d need to be 5-10 mins by bike to a train station.
Thanks
Banbury - or rather the villages near there. Good train links to London and others I think. M40 on its doorstep. Theres some quite active mtb groups near there and Oxford area. Not great for mtb as such but possible to get out. Chilterns not too far away. Probably a lot cheaper than Leamington.
warwick, leamington, solihull, lichfield, (because its near cannock) ..avoid coventry,nuneaton,rugby I cannot wait to leave this area(s) and move to cannock or nice part of rugeley
Somewhere around Hatton or Leek Wootton would work, close the Warwick Parkway station but in the country too. I fear it won't be cheap mind you.
Nice to see Stowerbrij and Wullustun gerrin some thumbs up. Raised and bred thiyer wor it. Some bostin Singletrack loops and lowuds of curnal towpaths linkinumup.
You might find that going east of Leamington towards southam is cheaper rent wise, but essentially the countryside around Warwick and Leamington isn't cheap!
Oh you could also look at wellesbourne too.
Stafford or Stone would be my choices. I live in Wolverhampton and there are some nice parts out towards the Shropshire side but they can be a bit remote.
Has no one read the OPs latest post? 😕
Has no one read the OPs latest post?
I did!
Basically, if you need rail access and want to be close to but not in Warwick/Leam you need to follow the Chiltern line from Brum, through Warwick and to Banbury on the map and pick somewhere you like close to that line. Truat me, Hatton, maybe Lapworth maybe Leek Wootton.
If you go to lemmers or Warwick I hope you're into road riding as there's hardly any off road on your door step.
North Worcestershire has plenty though & excellent transport links
Try again and look around Wombourne, Trysull, Kinver and Swindon
I grew up in Wombourne so bit biased but great location and easy reach of transport links
Try again and look around Wombourne, Trysull, Kinver and Swindon
I like all these places but they're not 10 mins from a train station.
Stourbridge is though, as is Wollaston, Hagley and maybe even parts of Clent if you're the right side of it.