Moving to Warrington area.. Advice please!

[alexd83]

DH has got a job in St Helens so we are looking at moving to the Warrington area. We live in Bury at the moment. My job is field-based so I just need to be close to the M6.

Areas I've read about and driven through and like the sound/look of are Stockton Heath, Appleton, Culcheth. Am I right in thinking these are nice?

Can anyone tell me about Latchford? Have noticed it's very close to Stockton Heath/Grappenhall but property is much cheaper. Is this because it's a bad area? DD is nearly 3 so we want to be in catchment for good primary schools.

Also is Grappenhall nice? Haven't explored it yet but seems slightly less pricey than SH.

Any advice much appreciated! Thanks :)

[Rosetti]

The first areas are definitely the best ones but can be expensive - Grappenhall Heys is also a nice area with an excellent junior school and secondary - are newer houses and close to both Stockton Heath and Appleton. Latchford is more mixed but also some nice areas

[mycatunderstandsme]

Latchford isn't really a 'bad' area but the schools aren't great which is why it's cheaper.

Grappenhall is a 'nice' area but doesn't have the village centre like Stockton Heath does. Has a post office and small Tesco local etc. Schools are good though.

Don't know that much about Culcheth!

[starsandunicorns]

Lives in north warrington im love it stockon heath is quite posh

[Sixtiesqueen]

Ok...

Stockton Heath is useful for shops and restaurants, though I actually think that Culcheth has a better range of shops and you get more for your money price wise with the housing stock. Stockton Heath has a good stock of houses of different styles. (What's your budget? This will affect the advice I would give).

Appleton is unofficially split into old and new areas. It starts south of the London bridge pub (on the corner of dingleway) but the area around the London bridge is a bit mixed (our friends moved away from that area due to people relieving themselves in the front garden on the way home). That said, south way and greenway are very nice.

Old appleton includes the area around windmill lane but that's very expensive. If you look around the golf club, so that's fairways, beech ways, pine way etc you will find a 1970s estate with good sized houses and pretty big gardens often ripe for redevelopment if you fancy a project that will add value. There is a good co-op here with a doctors and a pharmacy.

Further south you will find newer housing estates around beamish close, Hatfield gardens, stone acre gardens and stone hill gardens. These are just examples - there are lots of different Roads. The older the house, the bigger the garden. Houses on beamish close were some of the last to be built (1995?) so have smaller plots and are correspondingly cheaper. The three storey houses on pewterspear are on very small plots with slippery pavements!

The newer areas of appleton are served very well for open space, sports pitches etc. very pleasant place to be.

Grappenhall is a large area. The village itself is the area around the church (church lane/broad lane/bell house lane). This is a really nice little community with a thriving community centre, nice little walks, a cricket club and a sports club. The areas around st Wilfred's drive are good solid family areas of 1930 s semi detached houses. Kids play in the street on scooters. For detached, there's Sharon park close but that does suffer a bit from traffic noise as its close to a fast moving stretch of the A50 (though handy for the M6).

There are old Victorian houses around Alexandra road and balmoral road, near the Bridgwater canal. Lovely stock of houses around the £500k mark but tend to have small gardens. I general, the area of grappenhall the other side of the A50 is less desirable - so that's the north side of knutsford road between the A50 and the ship canal. Nothing wrong with it per se, just not as desirable and prices reflect that.

Grappenhall heys is a more recent development of larger houses, though there are some three storey terraces. It's not my cup of tea (quite isolated) but it has a little walled garden which is a sort of local charity who are trying to raise money to improve facilities and I think to restore a greenhouse. From grappenhall heys you can walk downhill to grappenhall village, though this is an isolated dog walkers type of path rather than somewhere you might feel comfortable to walk routinely (I walked it alone last week and didn't enjoy it).

Latchford is much more diverse. There is a very large council estate along with a lot of terraced housing and some semis but that said, it has a great range of shops. Restaurants there aren't great.

Have a look also at Stretton.

Schools - there are no bad ones really. Church schools in grappenhall (st wilfreds) and stretton (st matthews) are small, friendly community schools and well regarded. Grappenhall heys school, cobbs infants in appleton all good. Bradshaw lane a bit more mixed I think, but I don't hear bad things. Stockton Heath has st thomas' and Stockton Heath primary. The latter was in special measures, which I think was a bit unfair actually.

[starsandunicorns]

Oh and warrington is m6 south and north is very busy at rushhour so south warrington would mean a extra junction on m6 have you thought of north warrington good quick links to m6 and m62 or maybe newton le williows or burtonwood

[Sixtiesqueen]

Pm me if you like

[Sixtiesqueen]

I go up the m6 every morning from south warrington, it's fine. Traffic southbound always seems dodgy

[starsandunicorns]

I go the other way in mornings sixtiesqueen In the eveings I get on at lymm and only go one juntion northbound southbound is always busy hence me mentioning north Warrington

[Sixtiesqueen]

You will definitely get more in north warrington. I would look at north west warrington. Avoid callands, go for whittlehall. Coverdale close, that sort of area. Barrow hall school is good.

To give you an idea, a £450k appleton house will be yours for £275k in whittle hall.

However, your restaurant choices will be more limited and you will be closer to bigger places like ikea/marks and spencer/Asda.

Chapelford is a new area. I'm not that keen, the houses are really close together, lots of properties rented out. The school is new.

Think also about about high schools. In south warrington you would use Bridgwater high (outstanding ofsted). In Grappenhall you would go to Lymm high - consistently good. I north west warrington you want to aim for great sankey high (outstanding ofsted) not Penketh high (much poorer....sorry...I'm an ex pupil as well!). New rules have abolished 'feeder' schools in warrington and it now largely goes on distance when siblings are not already there.

I know high school is a long way off but it will creep up on you. The high school in latch ford (boteler) isn't great TBH

[Sixtiesqueen]

(Stars I prob go later. I join at about 8.45 and I'm at winwick in 15 mins - prob is busier earlier)

[iloveaglassofwine]

Sixtiesqueen has nailed it. Am also Warrington based and until recently lived in Grappenhall. It's a good place to live though like mycat pointed out, no centre - that said we tended to use Stockton Heath or Lymm for shops and restaurants. Schools in Latchford aren't fantastic which is reflected in the house prices. There's also Thelwall which has a good infant and junior school which have traditionally fed into lymm High. Appleton Thorn & Stretton are more rural, lovely and good schools there

North Warrington, I second Whittle Hall and Westbrook. Cheaper housing, still "naice" but not much in the way of cafe culture!

Feel free to pm me, have lived here almost all my life so happy to help.

[starsandunicorns]

I have leave at 6:50am my dd starts Penketh in
Sept for her last year there were no places at Sankey Penketh had a very good ofstead report she has to get the train

my dp went to Gregs
OP Warrington has 2 alidi and 2 lidls 3 asdas a massive tesco and sainsburys

[Sixtiesqueen]

I forgot about Thelwall. That's an okay area too and it has a little parade of shops I think (near beech road) but you'd use your car more.

My areas in order of preference would be:

Old appleton
Grappenhall village
New appleton
Stretton
Stockton Heath
Grappenhall
Thelwall
Grappenhall heys
Whittle hall
Latch ford

Others will disagree with that order I'm sure (could start a whole new sport!)

[Sixtiesqueen]

Oh hang on I'd insert Culcheth after grappenhall!

[iloveaglassofwine]

Sixtiesqueen, you must live v close by to me.

Until recently my DH went north M6 everyday and rarely had a problem with traffic. However, travelling south in an evening esp on a Friday could be tricky. That said, he did it for 8 years so can't have been that bad.

[iloveaglassofwine]

Sixtiesqueen, you must live v close by to me.

Until recently my DH went north M6 everyday and rarely had a problem with traffic. However, travelling south in an evening esp on a Friday could be tricky. That said, he did it for 8 years so can't have been that bad.

[GemmaTeller]

Culcheth has a lovely villagey feel, based around a green with a little play park, sit outside cafes and pubs, lots of 'old money' houses and one off architect houses - I pop over there to Black Sheep Wools (I'd be so disappointed if I found out it was full of feral youths at night!)

Lane Head area of Lowton / top of Newton Road is classed as a very sought after area (only down side to this is the road is gridlocked for an hour in the morning and at teatime)

Croft and Kenyon are very rural and again 'sought after'.

Rixton looks ok from what I've seen going to the farmers market.

All are within easy reach of the M6.

I used to go into Warrington from Lane Head and found the Winwick roundabout used to be a carpark between 8-9am but never had a problem coming home.

[Sixtiesqueen]

I really like Culcheth. I used to take DD1 to tumble tots there and wonder why we didn't move there in the first place. Mind you I'd spend all my money at Bents on overpriced sandwiches. The shops are great BUT I think south Warrington has the edge on countryside, it's bloody glorious!

(I love a glass of wine, I have lots of friends who love a glass of wine I wonder if one of them is you?! I'm in Appleton).

[GemmaTeller]

Sixtiesqueen we went to Bents, DH looked at the prices in the cafe and steered me back outside

We went to the little cafe/olde worlde sweet shop just up the road.

Culcheth has a gorgeous, to die for thai restaurant.

[Sixtiesqueen]

Oh yes it does. And that other one used to be good - Duck Egg Blu.

Bents is lethal.

[iloveaglassofwine]

Ah, Bents - a reason to live north side of warrington if ever there was one :0)

Sixties, my best friend at school lived on Hillside Rd, Appleton is lurverly. I live in Lymm now (hesitates slightly to say that), i love it but it gets a bit of a bad press on here.

[Sixtiesqueen]

Hillside road is lovely. You can just walk across the fields to Hatton or Wally Gardens. We walk that route frequently.

And so you should hesitate.......

[starsandunicorns]

Sixties we live in Orford am sure people will be clutching their pearles reading that

[starsandunicorns]

Last message for Iloveaglassofwine

[starsandunicorns]

Op read the local paper online to get a feel of the areas ( we didnt get to choose where we live) its the warrington guardian