Thinking of moving to Chester? Whether you’re starting a family, planning an investment or beginning higher education, here is what Chester has to offer.
House Prices 🏠
- Most expensive property £1.65 million
- Average house price in city: £220,102
- Cheapest property: £74,000
Property Investment 🏠 🏠
Chester is a walled city in Cheshire and has been settled since Roman times. It also played a major role in the Industrial Revolution:
- The city’s rich history has left it with an especially diverse population, with more than 90,500 inhabitants within its urban area
- Chester’s workforce area is even larger, with an estimated 850,000 living within a 30-minute drive of the city centre
- That workforce tends to be more skilled on average than other parts of the region.
Economy ££
The local economy is based largely on the service industries:
- In Chester’s case. this means tourism, retail and financial services and public administration
- The financial sector alone hosts major offices belonging to Bank of America, HBOS, NFU Mutual, M&S Bank and Virgin Money
- In nearby Broughton is the home of Airbus UK, a manufacturing plant which employs some 6,000 staff
- On nearby Deeside is the Iceland frozen food factory.
Location and Transport 🚌
Chester was and is still today at the hub of several modes of transport – road, rail and canal:
- Probably the most important hub today is the road network, with Chester within easy striking distance of the Wirral Peninsula and Liverpool via the M53 and the M56 towards Manchester
- The A55 gives access to the coast of North Wales, as far as Holyhead, and the A483 to Wrexham and Swansea in the south of Wales
- A new bus exchange centre is scheduled for completion in November 2016
- Train services provide similar links to Liverpool and the North Wales coast (and via Holyhead to Dublin), with an hourly train service to Leeds scheduled for completion in December 2017
- Once part of the large Shropshire Union canal system, Chester Canal today is used principally for recreational cruising.
Education 🎓
- Since 2005, the city has been able to boast its own university – University of Chester – and a campus of the University of Law
- The city’s West Cheshire College serves the vocational needs of a large part of the North West of England, with some 20,000 students enrolled at any one time
- The city also boasts a number of well-known independent and publicly-funded schools.
Environment 🌷
- Its Roman and Medieval history provides the principal backdrop to Chester’s environment
- The large racecourse is well-attended and provides a major green space
- Chester Zoo is often nominated the UK’s number one wildlife attraction.
Trivia 🎬
Finally, did you know …
- Chester racecourse is in fact the UK’s oldest sporting venue in continual use since 1539
- A Tudor law – which seems never to have been repealed – makes it illegal for a Welshman to enter the city after the hours of darkness, on pain of being shot at with locals’ bows and arrows
- Chester was a hub of entertainment in Roman times – the city’s amphitheatre had seating for 7,000 spectators.
