Didcot is greener than its industrial reputation suggests. There is a park or green space within a couple of minutes of most front doors. Water is a short walk away too. Old railway lines have become cycle paths. Beyond the edge of town, the farmland is put to some surprising uses.
On average, the nearest public green space is about 130 metres from home, and there are around 21 green spaces within a kilometre. A town best known for a junction and a power station has done well to fit in that much grass.
Water is close as well, with the nearest stretch on average about 380 metres away and around 21 bodies of water within a kilometre. The Thames runs a little further north, past Appleford-on-Thames, Sutton Courtenay and Long Wittenham.
The National Cycle Network is on average about 640 metres away, and about 51% of postcodes are close to it. Part of the route uses the embankment of the Didcot, Newbury and Southampton Railway towards Upton, with views back over the town. The railway was built to reach the south coast and never got there on its own, so the stretch near Didcot is the part that ended up getting used.
The rated-premises list for Didcot counts 216 shops, 316 offices, 18 pubs and 6 restaurants. Eighteen pubs against six restaurants gives a fair idea of how the town likes to spend an evening.
South Oxfordshire's fine-particle air pollution averaged about 7 micrograms per cubic metre in 2024, a figure for the whole council area.
The town has two characters. The old village survives around All Saints and the Didcot Old conservation area, while Ladygrove to the north and east and Great Western Park to the west carry most of the population. Outside it, the villages are older and lower: Blewbury and the Astons sit at the foot of the Downs, Blewburton Hill rises above them, and East Hagbourne and Harwell lie between. Science campuses at Harwell, Culham and Milton Park ring the town. The surrounding fields grow wheat and barley and, under licence from the Home Office, opium poppies for legal morphine.
Private gardens are generous. Across the town there are about 89,000 square metres of garden for every 1,000 residents. Most homes date from the late twentieth century or later, and they were built with lawns.
The Valuation Office's rating list counts 554 rateable premises in Didcot, from shops and offices to warehouses and industrial units. These are premises on the list, which may or may not all be trading.
Of the 153 food premises with a hygiene rating, about 64% hold the top score and about 3% sit at the bottom end of the scale.
No area of outstanding natural beauty, site of special scientific interest or ancient woodland overlaps the town. The Downs to the south and the Thames villages to the north are where the scenery is. Didcot is the practical place in the middle, with a park at the end of most roads.
For green space close to home, Didcot does very well. Parks, water and cycle routes are all within a short walk, and good countryside is a short ride beyond.