Middling, and the broadband travels further than the buses. A quarter of workers never leave the house to work. Six in ten drive. Almost nobody takes the train. The quickest way out of Ashley runs down a fibre cable.
The railway is close enough to name and far enough from most commutes to ignore. New Milton Rail Station is the local stop, with Hinton Admiral, Sway and Brockenhurst on the same line, yet under 1% of working residents commute by train. Buses fare no better: there are 53 bus stops in the area, and under 1% of workers use them to get to work. The infrastructure exists. The habit doesn't.
How Ashley gets to work is plain enough. About 60% of working residents drive and about 25% work from home. Walking accounts for about 6% and cycling about 2%. Only about 10% of households have no car, while about 51% run two or more. Commuting here gets settled in the driveway, and the second car is part of the deal.
The Department for Transport's journey-time statistics, modelled for the area rather than routed from any particular door, put the nearest town centre about 9 minutes away by car, 13 by bike, 21 by public transport and 27 on foot. Half an hour's walk into town is a nice idea on a spring Saturday and a poor plan with a week's shopping.
Broadband is Ashley's better connection. Gigabit-capable broadband reaches about 78% of premises and superfast about 99%. For the quarter who work from home, that matters more than any timetable.
Mobile coverage is not a worry: about 100% of the area gets 4G or 5G from at least one operator, and about 99% from all of them.
Charging an electric car in public is a different story. The area has 2 public charge points with 4 connectors between them, and none is rapid. Charging here is something you do overnight on the drive, not while nipping into the shops.
Everyday errands mostly come down to the car. The same modelled statistics put a GP about 9 minutes away by car, 20 by public transport and 26 on foot. A food store is closer, about 9 minutes' walk or 7 by car. Employment centres sit about 19 minutes away by car against 31 by public transport. The nearest hospital is about 32 minutes by car and about 77 by public transport, and that 77 is the figure worth remembering if the day comes when you can't drive. The public transport times date from 2019, and bus services tend to be cut rather than added, so treat them with more caution than the car and walking times.
The buses that do run are thin. Across the stops with timetable data, the average stop sees about 20 scheduled departures on a weekday and roughly two an hour at peak. About 92% of stops have some weekend service. That's a bus you plan your day around, not one you wander out to catch.
The roads are audible on the official noise maps. All the area's postcodes sit near or above 65 decibels of road noise, the level official mapping treats as significant, and the loudest band present reaches 75 decibels. Rail noise is mapped separately: about 97% of postcodes sit near the 65-decibel mark from the railway, with 65 decibels the loudest band. Neither figure tells you how loud any particular bedroom will be, which is what a viewing at rush hour is for.
Ashley's connections are middling at best: fine for a household with two cars and a home office, thin for anyone relying on the bus stop or hoping the railway will do the commuting for them.