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Coordinates: 51°34'N 0°35'E? / ?51.57, 0.59
Thundersley is a district forming most of the northern quarter of Castle Point Borough, in south east Essex, England, about 35 miles east of London.
[edit] Etymology
Thundersley derives from the Anglo-Saxon Þunres leah = "grove or meadow [perhaps sacred] belonging to the god Thor".
[edit] Location, geography and transport
Thundersley is bounded by the A127 road to the north, where it borders Rayleigh, the A130 road to the west where it borders Basildon, the A13 road to the south (bordering the South Benfleet district of Castle Point), plus a triangular salient further southward as far as Benfleet Road and Thundersley Glen, and eastwards beyond the A129 road bordering Daws Heath and Hadleigh, also within the borough. The Parish of Thundersley includes Daws Heath.
Thundersley is partly rural, with large woods and commons, including The Common, Coombe Wood, Starvelarks Wood, Wyeburns Wood, Tile Wood, Pound Wood, West Wood, Shipwrights Wood, Thundersley Glen, The Chase and borders on The Downs (largely in Hadleigh and South Benfleet), and partly suburban, with large areas of housing and small industrial parks. The area has the highest proportion of owner-occupied homes in Britain at 89%, along with the highest concentration of concrete per capita in the country. The King John School and Sixth Form are situated in Shipwrights Drive.
The district is relatively hilly and high above sea level for Essex, a typical height for the central and eastern part of (old) Thundersley is c. 200 ft (c.65 metres).
The nearest railway stations are South Benfleet and Rayleigh.
The district has no fixed speed enforcement cameras, but mobile ones are sometimes observed in Daws Heath Road about 0.5 miles east of The Woodmans Arms junction.
[edit] Entertainment
Hart Road contains the county's largest curry house, with entertainment facilities and Asian Elvis impersonators frequenting the upstairs area.
[edit] Politics
In 2005 the constituency that Thundersley is in, Castle Point, returned Conservative candidate Dr Robert Spink. However, Dr Spink left the Conservative party in 2008 and subsequently joined the UK Independence Party, whose whip he now takes in the House of Commons. The council is Conservative, with the party retaining control of the district in 2008's local elections.
[edit] Thundersley Invacar and Greeves motorcycles
Thundersley Invacar has made the district synonymous with disabled transport.
Greeves motorcycles were produced in a purpose-built factory at Thundersley from 1953 to 1976. Initially the bikes were an offshoot of the Invacar company which produced invalid cars and needed to diversify its products, and the founder of the concern was O.B. (Bert) Greeves MBE.
The bikes were exclusively two-stroke powered, using proprietary engines from Villiers and British Anzani initially and always for the roadsters, but by 1964 they had developed their own engine for competition use. For a few years, Greeves were remarkably successful in competition, with wins in the European Motocross Championship, the Manx Grand Prix, the European Trials Championship and the Scottish Six Days Trial, and with Gold medals in the ISDT and the ACU 250cc Road Race.
[edit] References
- Terry Babbington. (1993). Thundersley - A Pictorial History. Phillimore. ISBN 0850338727.
- John Greig. (1818). Antiquarian and Topographical Cabinet, Containing a Series of Elegant Views of the most interesting objects of curiosity in Great Britain Vol III. Thundersley, Essex. Published by J. Murray [etc.] page 202, plate 98.
(Source: Wikipedia) |