Gossops Green | |
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Gossops Green shown within West Sussex | |
OS grid reference | TQ255365 |
District | |
Shire county | |
Region | |
Country | England |
Sovereign state | United Kingdom |
Post town | CRAWLEY |
Postcode district | RH11 |
Dialling code | 01293 |
Police | Sussex |
Fire | West Sussex |
Ambulance | South East Coast |
EU Parliament | South East England |
UK Parliament | |
Gossops Green is a neighbourhood within the town of Crawley in West Sussex, England. Gossops Green is located in the west of the town and is bordered by Bewbush to the south west, Ifield to the north and Southgate to the east across the ring road. Gossops Green is also a local government ward.
There is mention of Gossipsgreen on a map dated 1795. Maps in the first half of the 1800s show Gossipsgreen in varying layouts surrounded by farmland and close to a few small estates. Gossipsgreen amounted to a hamlet along the north side of what is now known as Gossops Green Lane. The main road ran east-west through the settlement. At the west end the road turned north towards the village of Ifield passing The Craigans, a house with gardens which was demolished and developed as private housing in the 1970s. To the east the road ran to Crawley through what is now Goffs Park and West Green.
A road led south from Gossipsgreen approximately along what is now Dower Walk, past Dower House and Woldhurstlee estate and on towards Buxwood (later Buckswood) Farm. Woldhurstlee was demolished during the New Town development. The site of the house is now in public woodland off Buckswood Drive.
The railway was built in the 1830s to the north of Gossipsgreen and ran by Hazelwood, a wooded area behind the hamlet, then past The Craigans before dividing Ifield Mill Pond to the west. Ifield railway station was first a halt on the road leading from Gossipsgreen to Ifield.
During Victorian times, Gossipsgreen disappeared from published maps, though The Craigans, Dower House and Woldhurstlee continued to be marked. By 1946, a year before the formation of the Crawley Development Corporation, the hamlet reappeared on the map but the name had changed to Gossops Green.
Crawley Development Corporation was formed in 1947 as a result of the New Towns Act 1946. At this time, Crawley had a population of 6,000 people. It was a declared objective that the New Town would be home to 50,000 people by 1961. It had achieved this by 1958 before Gossops Green was built.