Grove is well connected by broadband and the main road, and poorly connected by everything that runs on rails. There is no station in the village, and almost nobody commutes by train. The buses are frequent. Half of working residents drive, and a third have stopped commuting altogether. Grove's real link to work is the internet, and the car comes second.
Grove has no station of its own, and fewer than one in a hundred working residents commute by train. The village has 38 bus stops, but only about 2% of residents take the bus to work. The buses are there, and most people drive past them.
The 2021 Census shows how Grove actually gets to work. About 53% of working residents drive. About 33% work from home, around 5% walk and about 2% cycle. About half of households have two or more cars, and only about 10% have none. On most driveways the car outnumbers the person who drives it to work.
The Department for Transport modelled journey times from Grove in 2019. On its figures, the nearest town centre is about 10 minutes away by car, 15 by bike, 19 by public transport and 34 on foot. The town centre is close enough to cycle to and just too far to walk to on a regular basis.
The same Department for Transport statistics give the typical Grove home a journey of about 9 minutes by car to a GP, 15 by public transport or 22 on foot. A food store is about 7 minutes away by car or 11 on foot. The nearest large employment centre is about 18 minutes by car or 24 by public transport. A hospital is about 44 minutes by car and about 81 by public transport. All of these are modelled averages for the area. The distances to fixed places like a GP or a hospital do not change. The public transport times date from 2019, and some services have been cut since then, so they are the least reliable of the set. A resident without a car should plan a hospital appointment around the bus timetable and allow most of the morning for it.
The bus timetables are better than the commuting numbers suggest. The 34 Grove stops with timetable data average about 68 departures each on a weekday and about four an hour at peak, and every one of them has some weekend service. That is a real bus service, and only about 2% of residents use it to get to work.
Gigabit broadband reaches about 93% of premises in Grove, and superfast reaches about 99%, with no premises below the legal minimum. Every postcode has a 4G or 5G signal from at least one network, and about 95% have coverage from every network. With a third of the working village at home, the broadband carries more of Grove's commute than the bus does.
Road and rail noise both reach the level official noise mapping treats as significant, which is 65 decibels. On that mapping every Grove postcode is near or above that level for road noise, with the loudest band reaching 75 decibels. Rail noise is mapped separately and gives the same picture, with every postcode near the threshold and the loudest band at 75 decibels. The trains pass through Grove without stopping, and some homes still hear them. Visit the house at a busy time of day and stand in the garden for ten minutes to hear it for yourself.
Grove has one public electric car charge point, with a single connector and no rapid unit. Williams Racing builds Formula One cars in this village, and a resident with an electric car will be charging it at home overnight.
In practice, getting around Grove means a car or a laptop. The village works for anyone who drives to work or works from home, and it is a slow, timetable-bound place for anyone who expected to commute by train.
Grove is middling for connections. The bus service, the broadband and the short drives are good, and the lack of a station holds the village back.