Car parking

The Dorset History Centre and Little Keep car park provides limited parking for visitors. This include three disabled parking bays.

Please see the plan of our site indicating the location of our visitor parking bays.

Please note that parking in Dorchester is often especially limited on Wednesdays, as this is market day.

New pay and display charges

New pay and display charges have now replaced the permit system. Parking charges will be inline with those charged at County Hall: 

• Up to 1 hour 60p

• Up to 2 hours £1

• Up to 3 hours £2

• All day (7am – 7pm) £3.40

• Overnight (7pm – 7am) 50p

Parking on the 'briquette' area will be for customers of the Dorset History Centre and all money raised will be used to support services provided by the History Centre.

If you have any concerns or comments regarding this change please contact:

Sam Johnston, County Archivist or Jacqui Halewood, Principal Archivist.

Please note that West Dorset Shoppers permits can not be used in our car park, as these are only valid in car parks run by West Dorset District Council.

Alternative parking

The nearest public car park at Top o' Town has both long and short stay parking. The market car park (not available on Wednesdays) is a 10 minute walk from the History Centre. On Saturdays there are plenty of parking spaces available in the car park behind the centre.

There are also three disabled parking bays in the centre car park.

There is a park and ride service which runs from Dorchester Town Football Ground (next to Tesco) on Weymouth Avenue to County Hall Monday to Friday.

Reaching us by bus

There are bus services to Dorchester from many parts of the county and Dorchester can be reached via the national coach network.

Reaching us by rail

Dorchester has two railway stations which run frequent services to Bristol, London, Poole and Bournemouth. Both are within 10-15 minutes walking distance of the Dorset History Centre.