Gillingham

Gillingham is the most northerly town in Dorset and in the last twenty years, has grown particularly rapidly and been successful in attracting a variety of new industries. Gillingham is important as a service and shopping centre for the surrounding villages.

Communications

Gillingham is located four miles north west of Shaftesbury at the junction of the B3095 and B3081. The A303 trunk road is only four miles away. The town has its own railway station on the Exeter to London line.

Education

Gillingham pyramid area:
Eight primary schools, one secondary school.
The secondary school for the area
Gillingham School (1,783 pupils- 2011)

For more information on Gillingham School (opens in a new window)

Commercial land

Between 1994-10, 12.2 hectares of industrial land has been developed in Gillingham. The total area of land with permission or allocated in local plans is 3.8 hectares.

Crime

Domestic burglaries

Rate per 1,000 households

Area	2002/03	2003/04	2004/05	2005/06	2006/07	2007/08	2008/2009	2009/10
Gillingham	5.5	4.6	3.2	2.7	3.9	n/a	4.6	2.4
DCC Dorset	6.6	6.6	6.5	5.7	4.4	n/a	4.1	3.8
South West	14.8	12.3	10.7	8.9	8.4	n/a	8.2	7.6
England and Wales	20.0	18.6 (GB)	14.4	13.5	13.1	n/a	12.2	11.6

Note: Due to small numbers of burglary rates for small geographical areas, for example towns, it can vary significantly from year to year.
Source: Dorset County Council

Other sources of crime data

Access the Police crime mapping Gillingham (opens in a new window) where you can find crime data on a month by month basis (starting December 2010) mapped to neighbourhood and street level. This looks at the crime types of burglary, anti-social behaviour, robbery, vehicle crime, violent crime and other crime. Note this comprehensive and up-to-date database only looks at numbers of crimes and not crime rates for individual crimes. It does give an overall crime rate (per 1,000 people) for the neighbourhood.

Population

Latest population figure (2010 mid year estimate) for the town (Gillingham Parish) 10,890

Year	1921	1931	1951	1961	1971	1981	1991	2001
Census population (enumerated)	3,290	3,270	3,350	3,620	4,050	5,440	6,740	9,340

Housing growth

Year	98	99	2000	2001	2002	2003	2004	2005	2006	2007	2008	2009	2010
Housing development	81	51	27	61	188	183	202	133	224	98	25	13	14

Note: figures allow for losses from re-development etc.

The 2001 Census records 4,211 dwellings in Gillingham.
Since 2001, a further 1,080 have been built giving a total of 5,291 dwellings.
At March 2010, a further 45 units have permission and 45 have been allocated in local plan.

Method revised 2009

Index of deprivation, 2007

(Figures show SOA ranking out of 247 SOAs in Dorset with 1 being the most deprived)

SOA	Multiple	Income	Employment	Health	Education & Skills	Housing & Services	Crime	Living
Gillingham Coldharbour	237	241	234	212	135	179	217	227
Gillingham Lodbourne	144	80	163	114	42	154	220	141
Gillingham Town	87	56	98	103	52	123	73	79
Gillingham Wyke	200	200	126	143	81	186	187	206
Milton	202	194	238	150	150	69	232	168

SOA = Super Output Area (minimum 400 households or 1,000 population)

Index of deprivation, 2010

SOA	Multiple	Income	Employment	Health	Education & Skills	Housing & Services	Crime	Living
Gillingham Coldharbour	241	235	229	197	152	215	243	232
Gillingham Lodborne	87	47	75	88	49	153	215	147
Gillingham Town	57	38	85	91	33	174	17	112
Gillingham Wyke	196	171	155	126	54	235	208	215
Milton	198	176	198	208	104	91	164	176

Please see The Index of Deprivation, 2010 for detailed information and mapping.

Source:DCLG

Average House prices

Dwelling type	Average Price July - Sept 2009	Average Price July - Sept 2010	July - Sept 2010 (sales)
Detached	£236,878	£271,762	28
Semi-detached	£160,646	£157,777	9
Terraced	£151,619	£141,728	14
Flats/maisonettes	£123,100	£145,562	8

Land Registry average prices (Prices may be affected by low number of sales). Sales relate to the postcode sector SP8 4

Area:

Approx 'built-up' area = 350 hectares (865 acres)

Local authority revenue

Council Tax for band D for Year	Council tax payable
11/12	£1,615.23
10/11	£1,615.17
09/10	£1,567.31
08/09	£1,510.11
07/08	£1,423.97
06/07	£1,357.79
05/06	£1,308.56
04/05	£1,243.21
03/04	£1,163.34
02/03	£1,020.21
01/02	£933.21
00/01	£873.45
99/00	£825.36

Second/Holiday and Empty Homes, 2011

Total dwellings on Council Tax Register	5,340
Total number of second homes	40
Second homes as a % of total dwellings	0.77
Total number of long term empty properties	42
Empty homes as a % of total dwellings	0.79

Source: Council Tax Register (parish figure, rounded)

Population 2010: Mid Year Estimates ONS

Gender breakdown	Dorset	Gillingham
Totals	404,790	10,890
Males	196,420	5,270
Females	208,370	5,620

Age structure (%): 2010 Mid Year Estimates ONS

Age range	Dorset	Gillingham
0-15	17.0	20.6
16+17	2.7	3.2
18-44	25.4	26.7
45-59	20.9	19.8
60-84	30.0	26.0
85+	3.9	3.7

Ethnicity (%): 2001 Census data

Ethnicity	Dorset	Gillingham
White British	96.8	97.5
BME	3.2	2.5

Health: 2001 Census data

Health category	Dorset	Gillingham
% with Long-term Illness / Disability	19.2	19.0
Health: % Good	68.1	69.2
Health: % Not Good	8.4	7.4
% Providing Unpaid Care	10.8	7.9

Poverty Indicators: Housing/Council Tax Benefit, 2009

Benefit population	Dorset	Gillingham
as a % of total town population	13.6	13.0

Socio-economic classifications, 2010 ACORN

Classification	Dorset	Gillingham
% Wealthy Achievers	40.1	36.8
% Urban Prosperity	7.1	4.3
% Comfortably Off	33.2	42.5
% Moderate Means	9.2	9.5
% Hard Pressed	10.2	6.9
% unclassified	0.2	0.0

ACORN is a geodemographic segmentation of the UK's population which segments small neighbourhoods, postcodes, or consumer households into five categories, 17 groups and 56 types.
The five higher level categories, wealthy achievers, urban prosperity, comfortably off, moderate means and hard pressed are shown above.

A full ACORN profile of the town with maps of the five wards is available. You can access the Gillingham ACORN Profile (pdf, 1Mb) (opens in a new window) for this information.

Retail profile - total town floorspace

61 shops/78,000sq.ft. (2005)

Town centre:

Mainly small shops, but including Lidl, Somerfield and Waitrose.

Catchment area:

The shopping catchment for Gillingham (major food shopping) extends around three miles in an east and west direction, but further to the north and south. The town competes with Wincanton to the West and Shaftesbury to the south-east. The Dorset population within the catchment is around 12,100 (mid 2001)

Library - Number of issues of books etc

Library	2007-08	2008-09	2009-10	2010-11
Gillingham	131,143	126,883	119,058	104,894

Source: Dorset County Council

Industrial estates

Ambassador Trade park, east Stour (1.3h), Brickfields Industrial Estate (2.92h), Brickfields Business Park (14.96h), Filly Brook Business Park, Buckhorn Weston (0.2h), Kingsmead Business Park (1.4h), Station Road Industrial Estate (1.77h), Tomlins Lane Industrial Estate (0.15h)

Unemployment % (persons)

Year	Male	Female	Total
July 1998	2.3 (19)	1.3 (9)	1.9 (28)
July 1999	3.0 (24)	2.0 (14)	2.5 (38)
July 2000	1.1 (10)	0.4 (3)	0.8 (13)
July 2001	1.7 (15)	0.7 (6)	1.2 (21)
July 2002	1.1 (12)	1.5 (12)	1.3 (24)
July 2003	1.4 (18)	1.1 (10)	1.3 (28)
July 2004	2.1 (22)	1.1 (10)	1.6 (32)
July 2005	1.8 (19)	0.7 (6)	1.3 (32)
July 2006	2.1 (22)	1.0 (9)	1.6 (31)
July 2007	1.1 (14)	0.5 (5)	0.8 (19)
July 2008	0.9 (25)	0.5 (12)	0.7 (37)
July 2009	2.2 (61)	1.2 (32)	1.7 (93)
July 2010	1.8 (50)	0.9 (25)	1.3(75)

Of July 2009 unemployment figures, the long-term unemployed = 2.2%
Of July 2010 unemployment figures, the long-term unemployed = 10.8%

2009 employment

Total number of people working in the town: 3,600

Number of Firms (excluding self employed) : 310

Work pattern	percentage
Full-time	62%
Part-time	38%

Type of employment	%
Manufacturing and other non service	19
Construction	4
Accommodation & Food Service activities	4
Other Services	5
Distribution including motor	26
Finance and business services	15
Public administration, Ed and Health	27

Source: Annual Source: Business Register and Employment Survey, 2009, ONS

Major employers

Bakers of Gillingham, Chester Jefferies Ltd, Dextra Lighting Systems plc,
Dorset County Council, J H Rose & Sons, Lidl, SCATS,
Sherman Chemicals, Sigma Aldrich Co Ltd, Co-op, Sydenhams,Waitrose.

Traffic counts in the Gillingham area - annual average daily traffic

Road	Location	AADF (Annual Average Daily Traffic)							Percentage Growth Since
No.		1983	1990	2000	2005	2008	2009	2010	2009	2008	2005	2000	1990	1983
									1 Year	2 year	5 Years	10 Years	20 Years	27 Years
B3081	West of Gillingham	1,800	3,000	3,400	4,700	4,500	4,600	4,600	0%	2%	-2%	35%	53%	156%
B3092	Milton on Stour	3,600	4,200	4,900	6,100	6,200	6,100	6,000	-2%	-3%	-2%	22%	43%	67%
B3081	East of Gillingham	4,200	6,200	8,600	10,100	9,300	9,900	9,300	-6%	0%	-8%	8%	50%	121%
B3081	Gillingham Relief Road (East)	Not Built	Not Built	12,200	13,500	13,200	13,200	12,800	-3%	-3%	-5%	5%	n/a	n/a