Bedford

Did you know

• Major local Higher Education facilities include the University of Bedfordshire with 23,000 students and Cranfield University with 3,800 post graduate students, 14,500 continuing professional development delegates and world-class research specialisms in aerospace, automotive, bio-science, energy, environment, manufacturing, security and defence.

  Bedford College with 16,000 students is rated by OFSTED as ‘outstanding’, a centre of vocational excellence in five disciplines and a trainer of thousands of managers and employees each year.

• Local Attractions

  If you are looking for a busy market town with fantastic schools and masses to do, then this ancient spot on the River Great Ouse could be an ideal choice. Bedford town centre is full of shops, pubs and restaurants and there is a good supply of Victorian houses around it. The town centre is also undergoing a massive renaissance with large scale ‘quarter’ redevelopments. The award-winning Castle Quay development, in the Cultural Quarter, is complete and almost fully occupied. The Riverside and bus station development schemes are completed with a major new retail space, leisure facilities, hotel, cinema, housing, and improved transport interchanges.

  Bedford is a hotspot for quality Italian bars and restaurants thanks to the strong Italian population who came to the town in the Fifties. The award-winning Bedford Park is one of five Bedford Borough Council managed parks which has been awarded a Green Flag. The Green Flag Award scheme recognises quality parks and open spaces in the UK and around the world. Bedford River Festival attracts around a quarter of a million people to the town. There is even an annual regatta which has a fabulous turn out.

• Property

  Bedford has an extremely good line in Victorian houses and nice neighbourhoods. The Castle Road area, with its mix of 19th-century terraces and semis and its good local shops, is especially nice. ... But around Bedford Park and Park Avenue has the largest and more expensive Victorian homes.

• Transport

  At the heart of Europe’s leading economic regions, 20 minutes away from flights to one hundred international destinations, half the UK’s population within a two-hour drive, good access to each of the Midland, East and West Coast Mainline railways; Work has already started on a new train link between Oxford and Cambridge, which will give Bedford new direct links to both cities over the next few years. With easy routes into London with the M1 and A1.