Kintbury has a station and is also within cycling distance of the highest hill fort in England. Fabulous scenery. 8)

Another suggestion is Kingsclere vicinity but you’d have to drive to Newbury station.

Even on empty trains, that’s over an hour of commuting each way

Where ever you live, if you’re driving to TVP or the general Reading area around rush hour then you’ll be looking at an hour in the car at least. In the car it’s 15 traffic free minutes door to door from my house to where I work in TVP, outside of school holidays if I leave the house at 8 I won’t get into the office until around 9.

I used to cycle from Fleet to TVP (~18 miles) faster than I could drive.

Thames Valley park is a very easy short bike commute from Caversham or Sonning, with a minimum of road work. You might find somewhere far cheaper to live in the former. It isn’t very Parisien, but Waitrose sells baguettes.

I live in Whitchurch on Thames, which is on the river opposite Pangbourne. There is a lovely ride along the Thames from mine, (a bit muddy at the mo, but still above water) which you could ride all the way to TVP (7-8 miles) with only about 100 metres of urban road. It also isn’t Paris, but some of the cafes have chairs and tables on the pavement and there is a very good cheese shop. And a roundabout.

Living the north of the Thames also gives you direct access to the Chiltern hills and its plethora of bridleway, cheeky trail and dogwalkers paths that make for some excellent XC riding. (When drier the current conditions)

I used to live in Oxford, which is great, but i’m now more than happy with Reading. The riding out of the doorstep is about as good as anything else in the South East, and I’ve found plenty of great shops and pubs etc, they just aren’t as obvious as in Oxford/bits of London.

Its also about half an hour into Paddington at the weekend, and trains run until pretty late at night.

Ohh I work in Thames Valley Park so are you Microsoft or Oracle? I commute from Farnborough. The commute has got worse this year. Last year it was taking just under an hour but now it takes 1 hour 10 minutes in the school holidays it takes 30 minutes. The train takes just as long. Had a go at seeing how long it would take me to cycle and that was just over an hour so now all I need to do is be prepared for good weather and organise work clothes and laptop to be in Reading! At least we were not affected by the floods like a lot of people living near Reading! As to where to live depends on your budget and what you want. I don’t understand why you would pay higher house prices to commute out of London.

Kintbury has a station and is also within cycling distance of the highest hill fort in England. Fabulous scenery.

Highest hill in the SE in general as well (Walbury, 297m) – though I’m sure I’ve seen Leith Hill measured at the same?

I live in Thatcham which I am sure is very comparable to Paris, although I have never been to paris. It has trains into Reading. My drive to work in Reading can take from 40 mins to an hour and 40 on the odd occasion. Its a bloody nightmare. Hopefully my leg will be repaired on monday so I can get back on the motorbike soon. If you work in Reading and dont need to worry about schools and kids and all that stuff just get a place in Reading. Its alright.

Another Wokingham resident here – there are about 5 trains an hour (during peak) to Reading although TVP is just over 2 miles from station. Caversham seems to be well regarded by others albeit more expensive. I know some people are contemplating buying in Maidenhead – thinking that in terms of a long term investment they will capitalise on uplift in property values once Crossrail comes to fruition (due to Maidenhead in 2019).

I’ve worked and lived in reading for 12 years. Lived in

Twyford – easy ride or train in to reading and tvp. But don’t live near the station, gets a bit rough a night.

Whitchurch – easy train to reading or better still bike to tvp.

Central reading – some nice places near the university. Walk to work. But takes longer to get out biking somewhere.

Cholsey – train to reading (23mins) or bike (45mins). Where I live now!

Depends how long a commute you want but I’d say pangbourne, goring or cholsey. Train station if you want it, you can bike in if you want, nice villages, nice biking nearby. Personally I wouldn’t go south area of reading as it’ll be a bugger to get to tvp.

Ignoring things like schools, nightlife, etc for TVP you want to be somewhere along the A329M or the A4. Depending upon budget you should consider Wokingham, Twyford, Sonning, Wargrave, Maidenhead or some of the smaller villages along the way. Even Windsor if you don’t mind a bit more of a drive.

Don’t go north of the river if you value your sanity – places like Henley and Caversham are lovely, but the bridges are not for crossing, just for queuing at.

Pangbourne has a Bentley and Lamborghini dealer. Which is nice.

Pangbourne has a Bentley and Lamborghini dealer. Which is nice.

But you will also need a boat to get to and from work…

Personally I wouldn’t go south area of reading as it’ll be a bugger to get to tvp.

More of a bugger than north and having to cross the river? Have you seen the traffic around Reading the last month or so since Sonning bridge has been closed?!

Live in Thatcham and if it was me, I would stay east of Reading if working where you do. Getting there from the west consists of jammed M4/ A329m or crawling A4 in the mornings and not much better in the evenings. If you decide to live on the West, then the kennet rolls straight into the business park by biking in. You can follow the Thames path from Tilehurst, past Cav and Reading bridge to Cav lock and onto the kennet bridge and to the park. Nice enough ride in the nice days. Bit dodgy in the winter. Or like people say, Wokingham, finchampstead ,back of Twyford etc

Tony – that’s why I said pangbourne etc. you can train it in, if you drive you don’t need to go over the bridge but better still it’s faster to bike in! Off road and on road options.

Basingstoke etc would be a bugger and I wouldn’t live north ( like sonning common) as you’ll have the bridges etc.

Or live near Mandela house 😉

Agree Pangbourne area nice Rob, but train doesn’t get you very close to TV and for two thirds of the year commuting by bike is miserable.

The more I think about it the more likely I would be to live in Windsor if moving to the area now.

I used to work on TVP. Free courtesy bus from the station, if not mentioned above. Relatively frequent service. I used to drive from Haslemere, relatively early in the morning, but traffic can be kak. Used to be 1hr at best. Trains are hellish busy coming into reading, took a bike on the train once (to see if cycle commuting was feasible), had to miss a train as it was so busy.

Would look at Oxford area maybe, but whatever somewhere away from Reading personally. I am not a lover of big towns, so not a slight on Reading itself, but just prefer the green fields.