Well enough for a village that mostly doesn't commute. It has its own station on a line into London. The buses come often. The broadband is excellent. Most of the working population stayed put on census day, which is the real story here.
Thames Ditton Rail Station has been on the Hampton Court branch line since the railway arrived in 1849, with direct trains to London Waterloo. Surbiton Rail Station is close by for faster trains, and Hinchley Wood, Esher and Hampton Court stations are all within reach. Even so, only about 5% of working residents took the train to work at the 2021 census, and about 1% took the bus, despite 168 bus stops across the area. A village that spent a century and a half being sold on its train service now mostly ignores it.
The census was taken in 2021, when home-working was at its peak, and 60% of working residents in Thames Ditton were working from home. About 24% drove, 4% walked and 3% cycled. Car ownership is high: 39% of households have two or more cars and only about 11% have none. The commute that matters most here is the one from the kitchen to the desk, and the second most popular involves a driveway.
The Department for Transport's modelled journey times, which date from 2019, put the nearest town centre about 10 minutes away by car, 17 by public transport, 13 by bike and 23 on foot. A GP is about 8 minutes by car, 13 by public transport and 14 on foot. A hospital is 18 minutes by car and 37 by public transport, and a food store is about 7 minutes whether you walk or drive. Employment is about 7 minutes by car and 14 by public transport. These are modelled averages across the area, and the distances to fixed places don't change, though the public transport times are the shakiest of the set because services have been cut since they were calculated. Hospital trips are the weak point for anyone without a car.
The buses themselves are a proper service. The average stop sees about 272 scheduled departures on a weekday and about 16 at the peak hour, and 94% of stops have some weekend service. Ring-fenced as it is by cars, the village has buses that run often enough for nobody to bother with a timetable.
Broadband is close to perfect. Gigabit broadband reaches 94% of premises, superfast broadband reaches all of them, and none fall below the legal minimum service level. Mobile coverage is complete too, with 4G or 5G from at least one operator, and from all of them, across the whole area.
Road noise is the trade for all that access. Every postcode in Thames Ditton is near the 65-decibel level that official noise mapping treats as significant road noise, and the loudest band reaches 75 decibels. Rail noise is a separate source, with about 14% of postcodes near 65 decibels from trains and the loudest band also at 75. Stand in the garden of a shortlisted house at the morning rush to hear what the noise maps mean for that particular plot. The maps can't tell you how a room sounds with the windows shut.
For electric cars there are 63 public charge points in the area with 74 connectors between them, though only 3 are rapid chargers. With a driveway, that's fine. Without one, charging is something to plan around.
Thames Ditton is better connected than most villages, with a station, frequent buses and first-rate broadband, and held back mainly by the road noise and the long trip to hospital without a car.