Shefford is well connected if you drive and work from home, and poorly connected if you need anything else. There is no station in the town. Hardly anyone commutes by bus or train. Most households have at least two cars. The broadband is excellent, and it does more of the town's commuting than the trains do.
Shefford's nearest rail stations are Arlesey and Biggleswade, both outside the town. At the 2021 census about 1% of working residents took the train to work and about 1% took the bus, though the town has 29 bus stops. Shefford got its station from the Midland Railway in 1857 on what was then its main line to London. The line was downgraded to a branch in 1868, lost its passengers in 1961 and its freight in 1964. Each change left the town with less, and the last one left it with nothing.
The census shows how the town really gets to work. About 54% of working residents drove and 34% worked from home. Walking accounted for about 5% and cycling about 1%. Only about 10% of households had no car, and about 52% had two or more. In Shefford a household's commuting plan is mostly a matter of who takes which car.
The Department for Transport's modelled journey times for the area, which date from 2019, put the nearest town centre about 19 minutes away by car, 32 by public transport, 38 by bike and 107 on foot. Walking to the nearest town centre takes the best part of two hours, which means hardly anybody does it. The same modelling gives a GP about 10 minutes away by car, 17 by public transport and 25 on foot. A food shop is about 8 minutes by car or 16 on foot. A hospital is about 28 minutes away by car against 55 by public transport, and the nearest large employment centre about 12 minutes by car against 23. The distances will not have changed since 2019, but bus services can be cut, so the public transport times are the least reliable figures in that list.
Current timetable data is less optimistic than the stop count. Shefford's stops average about 12 departures each on a weekday, and fewer than one an hour at peak. Every stop with timetable data has some weekend service. A dozen buses a day is enough to get you to the shops, and not enough to plan a working day around. If you are moving here without a car, look up the departures at the stop nearest your new front door and see whether they fit your hours.
Broadband is the one connection that works for almost everybody. Gigabit connections reach about 94% of premises, superfast reaches 100%, and no premises fall below the legal minimum service. Nearly every postcode has 4G or 5G from at least one network, and about 99% are covered by every operator. A third of the working town stays at home, and the internet is what lets it.
Road noise needs mentioning. Official noise mapping treats 65 decibels as the level at which road noise becomes significant, and about 99% of Shefford's postcodes are at or near that level. The loudest band recorded in the town reaches 75 decibels. Rail noise is not an issue, since no postcodes come near the threshold, which is what happens when the trains left more than sixty years ago.
Electric car owners will be charging at home. The town has 2 public charge points with 4 connectors between them, and none of them is rapid. With no rapid charger in town, a top-up is something you plan for. You cannot do it while you shop.
Shefford's connections are below average for anyone without a car or a laptop, because the railway has gone and the buses only cover the basics. For a two-car household with a fast broadband line, the town works well enough.