Harefield, Hampshire

Infobox UK place
country = England
map_type = Southampton
official_name= Harefield
latitude = 50.9188
longitude = -1.3427
population = 13,711Cite web | url=http://www.neighbourhood.statistics.gov.uk/dissemination/LeadKeyFigures.do?a=3&b=6076218&c=harefield&d=14&e=15&g=412112&i=1001x1003x1004&m=0&r=1&s=1215215184593&enc=1 | title=Harefield (Ward) — Key Figures for 2001 Census: Key Statistics | publisher=Office for National Statistics | date=2001 | accessdate=2008-06-27]
area_total_km2 = 2.62
unitary_england= Southampton
lieutenancy_england= Hampshire
post_town= SOUTHAMPTON
postcode_area= SO
dial_code= 023
constituency_westminster=Southampton Itchen
region = South East England
postcode_district = SO18
static_

static_image_caption = Cheriton Avenue, Harefield

Harefield is a suburb and Electoral Ward near Bitterne in Southampton, England. The entire suburb consists of a council housing estate built around 1960 on the convert|238|acre|km2|sing=on estate of Harefield House.Fact|date=July 2008

Harefield Ward had a population of 13,711 as of the 2001 Census, and is adjacent to Bitterne Park, Peartree, Sholing and Bitterne wards.

History

Harefield House was a country house of Elizabethan style built in 1834 for Sir Edward Butler, chairman of the Southampton and Salisbury Railway Company, in what are now the grounds of Harefield Infant and Junior Schools on Yeovil Chase. Edwin Jones, the Southampton draper whose store ultimately became part of Debenhams bought the house in 1887 and it burnt to destruction in 1915 while occupied by his widow. The Jones family sold the estate in 1917 and there was some building in the 1920s but it was not developed in earnest until after the Second World War.

The area was part of the civil parish of West End when it was established in 1894, but was transferred into Southampton in 1954. [http://www.hants.org.uk/westendlhs/briefhist.html West End Local History Society: Brief History of West End] ]

The street names on the western edge of the estate are all named after Somerset place names by the private housing developers active in the late 1940s and early 1950s. The later council housing extended these streets and added more to the west that are named after Hampshire villages.

The development of the housing estate included two public houses (the Exford Arms and the Hare and Hounds), two shopping parades, two primary schools (Harefield and Moorhill, each consisting of infant and junior schools), and Moorhill Secondary School (named after Moorhill House, which stood just outside the estate in West End). The Moorhill schools and the Exford Avenue shopping parade were constructed in 1964-65. Until that time there was a Post Office in a Nissen hut opposite the Exford Arms.

Moorhill Secondary School was renamed as Woodlands Community School in 1984, and subsequently demolished and rebuilt in 2003. It is now known as Woodlands Community College.

Transport Links

Harefield has had a number of different local bus services over the years. It now shares the service 9 and the service 10 with nearby Thornhill, both run by First Southampton. Their previous service 4 was revoked after consistent vandalism and misuse.

References

*Jessica Vale. "The Country Houses of Southampton".

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