lthough Wotton is a single parish, the stream has always proved to be a dividing line between Wotton and Bradley on the one side and Synwell and Wortley on the other. Until the First World War, the town must have changed very little since the building of many fine houses in the 18^th century as a result of the wealth created by the cloth trade. After 1918 several small housing developments took place, with council housing beginning in the twenties when Lisle Place was built on what had been a school playing field. Land and property in the town still in Berkeley ownership was put on the market just after the war and land off Symn Lane was bought to provide a playing field for the Grammar School. The Blue Coat Primary School moved into new buildings on this site early in 2000.

The new Blue Coat Primary School.

The growth on the Synwell side of the stream has been even greater and began in 1948 when Mount Pleasant and Fountain Crescent were begun as the first phase of a considerable programme of Council housing. Private developers also created housing estates - Court Orchard rising from the stream side, Shepherds Leaze, Cherry Orchard and the last, Bearlands, which marks the boundary of expansion on the road to Wortley and Alderley and had a mixture of council and private housing. Since the 'right to buy' policy came in, the old distinction between privately owned houses and council houses has largely disappeared. Also on this side of town is the British School, which moved into new buildings on a site in Wortley Road in 1971 and had to be replaced with another new building in 1990.

Post-war developments included a new Fire Station and a Clinic in Symn Lane and a Public Library in Ludgate Hill.

In the last decade there has been much less new housing as the town has no remaining open spaces. In the latest Local Plan the only allocated site for housing is the area east of the Chipping recently vacated by the Blue Coat School. The Civic Centre is located in the former offices of Renishaw's and the factory area behind, previously the Stokes' Ice Cream Factory, has been made into a much needed car park.

A Tour of the Town

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Shopping and Working in Wotton