Havant

A medieval crossroads where the Spanish Armada's timbers ended up holding up a pub roof, and the Treaty of Versailles was written on the local parchment, which is the kind of CV most towns would dine out on for a century. Havant celebrated by getting itself burned down in 1760, bolting a vast post-war council estate onto its northern flank in the 1950s, and then quietly settling into the role of the place everyone changes trains at on the way to somewhere they wanted to live more. The town fancies itself the practical option between Chichester's cathedral money and Portsmouth's seafront chaos, and the Wickes car park on a Saturday morning will tell you whether that pitch is working. Spoiler: it is, mostly, in the way Wickes car parks always do.