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Town in Berkshire, England
the town

Slough (/s//l//aʊ/) is a town in Berkshire, England, in the Thames Valley 20 mile (32 km) west of central London and 19 mile (31 km) north east of Reading, at the intersection of the M4, M40 and M25 motorways. It is part of the historic county of Buckinghamshire. In 2021 Census, the population of the town was 143,184. In 2021, the wider Borough of Slough had a population of 158,500. Slough borders the ceremonial counties of Greater London and Buckinghamshire. Slough's population is one of the most ethnically diverse in the United Kingdom, attracting people from across the country and the world for labour since the 1920s, which has helped shape it into a major trading centre. In 2017, unemployment stood at 1.4%, one third the UK average of 4.5%. Slough has the highest concentration of UK HQs of global companies outside London. Slough Trading Estate is the largest industrial estate in single private ownership in Europe, with over 17,000 jobs in 400 businesses. Blackberry, McAfee, Burger King, DHL, Telefonica and Lego have head offices in the town.

In the 21st century, Slough has seen major redevelopment of the town centre. Old buildings are being replaced with new offices and shopping complexes. Tesco has replaced an existing superstore with a larger Tesco Extra. The Heart of Slough Project is plan for the large scale redevelopment of the town centre as a focus and cultural quarter for the creative media, information and communications industries created a mixed use complex, multi functional buildings, visual landmarks and a public space in the Thames Valley. Approval was given for the £400 million project by Slough Borough Council's planning committee on 9 July 2009, and work began in 2010 for completion in 2018. In December 2009, two key components of the project were signed: the Homes and Communities Agency (HCA) signed its agreement to provide £11m of funding for infrastructure and Thames Valley University (TVU) courses which were due to remain in the town found a new home at the Centre in Farnham Road, Slough. In parallel to the town centre redevelopment plan, Segro (owner of the Slough Trading Estate) planned to spend £600 million over the following 20 years on the estate. This was intended to create environmentally sustainable buildings, open green spaces, two hotels, a conference centre, cafés, restaurants and better transport facilities to improve links to Slough town centre and the surrounding residential areas. It was claimed that the plan would create more than 4,100 new jobs and contribute around £100m a year to Slough's economy. If both plans went ahead, nearly £1 billion would be spent on redeveloping Slough over the next 20 years. In 2009, Herschel Park (known as Upton Park until 1949), named for astronomer William Herschel, was relandscaped in a multimillion pound effort to bring it back to its former Victorian era glory. The park was featured in an episode of the documentary programme Who Do You Think You Are? focusing on the TV presenter Davina McCall. In 2010, £2 million was set aside to improve disabled access to Slough railway station in preparation for an expected increase in use during the 2012 London Olympics. Preparations were under way for the regeneration of the Britwell suburb of Slough, involving tearing down a dilapidated block of flats and the closing of the public house the Jolly Londoner in Wentworth Avenue and replacing them with new homes, as well as relocating the shopping parade in the street to nearby Kennedy Park. As part of the Heart of Slough project, construction work on a new bus station began in March 2010, following weeks of demolition work to half of the existing bus station and the removal of Compair House near the railway station. It was opened in May 2011. Redevelopment on this scale has been strongly criticised by conservation groups. The Twentieth Century Society has stated that
[A] tragically high quantity of good buildings have been demolished in Slough in recent years, including grand Art Deco styled factories by the likes of Wallis Gilbert and high quality post war offices. More are to come down as the town tries to erase its past and reinvent itself from scratch. Despite famously heckling Slough, John Betjeman's praise for the town hall's architecture as 'a striving for unity out of chaos' in 1948 has never been so relevant as today. C20 believes that the redevelopment of the town hall would be an act of vandalism to the civic centre and is supporting the Campaign to Save Slough's Heritage in their request for a review of the decision. During November 2016, the Slough Queensmere and Observatory shopping centres were sold to Abu Dhabi Investment Authority (ADIA) in a deal worth £130 million.

Slough is 20 mile (32 km) west of Charing Cross, central London, 2 mile (3 km) north of Windsor, 5 mile (8 km) east of Maidenhead, 11 mile (18 km) south east of High Wycombe and 19 mile (31 km) north east of the county town of Reading. Slough is within the Greater London Urban Area and on the border with London Borough of Hillingdon and London Borough of Hounslow. Heathrow Airport is 5 miles away. Nearby towns are Uxbridge to the northeast and Beaconsfield to the north. Most of the area that now makes up Slough was anciently part of Buckinghamshire, however, Poyle was historically in Middlesex. The town developed by the expansion and amalgamation of villages along the Great West Road. Over the years Slough has expanded greatly, incorporating a number of different villages. Original villages that are now suburbs of Slough include Chalvey, Cippenham, Colnbrook, Langley, Poyle, Upton, and Wexham. Named neighbourhoods include Brands Hill, Britwell, Huntercombe, Manor Park, Salt Hill, Upton Lea and Windsor Meadows. The urban area merges into the neighbouring parishes of Burnham, a small area of Taplow near Cippenham, Farnham Royal and Stoke Poges which remain in the county of Buckinghamshire and Datchet which is in Berkshire. Eton is narrowly buffered by the Jubilee River and by green space (mainly the college playing fields) from part of Slough, and the two areas formerly formed the Eton birth, marriages and deaths registration district.

The nearest Met Office weather observing station to Slough is Heathrow Airport, about 5 mile (8 km) east of Slough town centre. This part of the Thames Valley is notable for generally having the warmest daytime summer temperatures on average in the British Isles. Typically, according to 1981–2010 normals, the average high temperature in July is 23.5 °C (74.3 °F.) Rainfall is low compared to most of the British Isles, with under annually, and 105 days reporting over 1 mm of rain.

In 1863, Slough became a local government area when a Slough Local Board of Health was elected to represent what is now the central part of the modern Borough. This part of Upton cum Chalvey Civil Parish became Slough Urban Sanitary District in 1875. The functions of these two bodies were strengthened in 1894, when Slough Urban District was created, Buckinghamshire County Council having been created in the previous decade. In 1930, there was a major extension westward of the Urban District, and the area was divided into electoral wards for the first time (the new areas of Burnham (Beeches), Farnham (Royal) and Stoke (Poges) (commonly used suffixes) as well as the divisions of the old district Central, Chalvey, Langley and Upton). In 1938, the town became a Municipal Borough by Royal Charter. Slough was transferred to Berkshire in the 1974 local government reorganisation. The old Municipal Borough was abolished and not deemed part of an urban conglomeration, replaced by a non city type second tier authority (Non metropolitan district), which was however made a Borough by the town's second Royal Charter. Britwell and Wexham Court became part of Slough at this time, with their civil parish councils. On 1 April 1995, the Borough of Slough expanded slightly into Buckinghamshire and Surrey, to take in Colnbrook and Poyle and merged their civil parish councils. Slough became a unitary authority, on 1 April 1998. This coincided with the abolition of Berkshire County Council and the dissolution of its Borough Status received under its second Royal Charter. However, to enable the continued use of the word Borough, as in some other parts of Berkshire, Slough received its third Royal Charter in 1998. Since 2015, Slough has had a Youth Parliament to represent the views of younger people.

Before the 19th century, the main businesses of Slough were brickfields and agriculture. The bricks for the building of Eton College were made in Slough. Later, as the Great West Road traffic increased, inns and pubs sprang up along the road to service the passing trade. Until the town developed as an industrial area, nurseries were prominent in the local economy; the Cox's Orange Pippin apple was first raised in Colnbrook (not then within Slough) around 1825, and the dianthus "Mrs Sinkins Pink" was first raised at some point between 1868 and 1883 by John Sinkins, the master of the Eton Union Workhouse, which lay in Slough. In the mid 19th century, the only major employer apart from the brickfields was James Elliman, who started as a draper in Chandos Street. In 1847, he changed business and manufactured his Elliman's Embrocation and Royal Embrocation horse liniment at factories in Wellington Street and Chandos Street. Elliman became a major benefactor to the town, and is remembered today in the names of local roads and schools. In September 1851, William Thomas Buckland, an auctioneer and surveyor from nearby Wraysbury, began livestock sales in a field near the Great Western Road Railway Station belonging to the North Star Inn. Originally held on the first Tuesday of every month, the Cattle Market's popularity soon saw this increased to every Tuesday. A move to Wexham Street was necessitated by the postwar redevelopment of the town. The Slough Cattle Market was run by Messrs Buckland and Sons until its final closure in 1988. In 1906, James Horlick, one of the founders of the eponymous malted milk company, opened a purpose built red brick factory near Slough Railway Station to manufacture his malted milk product. In 2015, the business was sold by Glaxo Smith Kline and in 2017, manufacturing at the site ceased altogether. The site is currently proposed to become residential making use of the original buildings as much as possible. Starting in the 1920s, Slough Estates Ltd, the operator of the original Slough Trading Estate, created and operated many more estates in the UK and abroad. The Slough Trading Estate meant that the town was largely insulated from many of the effects of recession. For many years, Slough's economy was mainly manufacturing based. In the last 20 or so years, there has been a major shift from a manufacturing to an information based economy, with the closure of many factories (some of which had been in Slough for many decades). The factories are rapidly being replaced by office buildings. Hundreds of major companies have sited in Slough Trading Estate over the years, with its proximity to London Heathrow Airport and good motorway connections being attractive. In the 1960s, Gerry Anderson's film company was based in Slough, and his Supermarionation series, including Thunderbirds, were filmed there. The UK headquarters of Mars, Incorporated is in Slough, the main factory having been established in 1932 by Forrest Mars Sr. and Frank C. Mars. It produced the Mars Bar in Slough over 70 years ago. One of the Mars factories has been demolished and some production has moved to the Czech Republic. The European head offices of major IT companies such as BlackBerry, McAfee, Computer Associates, PictureTel and Compusys (among others) are all in the town. O2 is headquartered in the town across four buildings. The town is also home to the business support organisation Thames Valley Chamber of Commerce Group and National Foundation for Educational Research, which is housed in the Mere. Recent new offices include those of Nintendo, Black and Decker and Abbey business centres. The registered office of Furniture Village lies in the town. The motor trade has long been represented in Slough. Until 1966, Citroën assembled cars in a Liverpool Road factory (later used by Mars Confectionery), and it retains its UK headquarters in the town. Ford built D Series and Cargo lorries at its factory in Langley (a former Hawker Aircraft site) from 1936 to the 1950s until the site was redeveloped for housing in the 1990s. Ferrari, Mercedes, Fiat and Maserati now have offices in the town.

Located roughly 20 mile (32 km) west of Central London, Slough is a commuter town near Heathrow Airport (7 mile (11 km) south east), Uxbridge (6 mile (10 km) north east), Maidenhead (5 mile (8 km) west) and Staines (7 mile (11 km) south east). Slough residents also commute to Windsor, Reading and Bracknell as well as Central London. There are large passenger movements in the morning and evening rush hours. Road transport in Slough includes:
Within Slough: Buses (First Berkshire & The Thames Valley, Arriva Shires & Essex, Redline & Carousel Buses (only Sundays)), taxis, minicabs and private cars on roads are also used. To Heathrow Airport: First Berkshire & The Thames Valley bus routes 75, 76, 77 and 78 serve Slough town centre, Langley and Heathrow Airport. First also run bus routes 71 (via Windsor, Egham & Staines upon Thames) and 60/61 (via Datchet, Horton & Wraysbury) to Heathrow Terminal 5. Taxis and minicabs are also available at a higher cost. To Central London: Buses and Greenline coaches are available, but rail is more generally used as express trains connect Slough to London Paddington in 14 minutes. To Birmingham: Bharat Coaches provide services from Southall to Birmingham/Wolverhampton/Coventry/Leeds/Bradford and Leicester via Slough. Slough is bounded by the M4 to the south and is served by junctions 5, 6 and 7; other roads serving the town include the A4, A355, and A412.

Slough is served by Great Western Railway stations at Burnham, Slough and Langley. Slough station is a junction between the Great Western Main Line and the Slough to Windsor & Eton Line to allow passengers to connect for Windsor & Eton Central. Reading: Great Western Railway operate fast services to Reading every half an hour which take about 15 minutes, as well as slow services every fifteen minutes which take 30 minutes. London Paddington: Great Western Railway operate express services to London every half an hour which take 14 minutes, as well as slow services every fifteen minutes taking 26 minutes. Slough has services on the Elizabeth line, a new railway line across central London opened in 2022. The Western Rail Approach to Heathrow is a £500m rail project announced by the Department for Transport; Network Rail announced the route in 2014. It will directly serve Slough with four trains every hour, reducing travel times to Heathrow to six minutes. It is expected to be operational in the early 2020s.

National Cycle Network route 61 runs through central Slough. A Smoove bike sharing system was launched in October 2013, targeting commuters travelling between the trading estate and nearby railway stations.

Slough is connected by the Slough Arm to the main line of the Grand Union Canal which runs between the Thames at Brentford and Birmingham. It travels from the terminus basin at Stoke Road to the junction with the main line at Cowley Peachey; it was restored to navigability in 1975 having been disused since 1960.

Slough has a senior non League football team, Slough Town F. C., who currently play in the National League South. Slough also host the ice hockey team, the Slough Jets. They play in NIHL South Division 1. Reading F. C. Womens and Republic of Ireland Womens goalkeeper Grace Moloney was born and lives in the town.

There are numerous primary and secondary schools serving Slough. In addition, East Berkshire College has a campus in the area. Slough schools are in the top 10 best performers in the country at GCSE level. In 2011, 68.1% of pupils left school with a minimum of 5 A* C grades (with English and maths). The national average is 58.9%. Thames Valley University (Slough Campus) is currently closed due to the Heart of Slough project. The new campus was scheduled to be opened in 2013 as part of the University of West London, but as of March 2022 there had been no progress, as the former site of the university had been sold for housing.

Slough has a relatively high crime rate; figures for all crime categories are annually above the English average and figures for a few categories are at more than double the frequency. According to British Crime Survey statistics, as of September 2013, Slough had the second worst rate of crime among local authority areas in the Thames Valley Police counties (87 recorded crimes per 1,000 population vs Oxford's 104). However the borough's crime rate reduced by 29% in the ten years to 2013. In the year ending September 2017, the crime rate in Slough was the third highest in the Thames Valley force area, behind Reading (96.42 police recorded crimes per 1000 population) and Oxford (100.71 for the same metric).