Photo: PaleCloudedWhite · CC BY-SA 4.0Parks and walks in Puddletown
The Dorset National Landscape begins 1.4 mi from the village’s edge. Parks and playing fields in Puddletown add up to 0.2 ha for every 1,000 residents; the typical UK town has 2.1. No park or playing field is mapped within a 5-minute walk of homes in Puddletown. Puddletown grades D for the outdoors. A character grade: it isn’t part of the overall grade.
What kind of outdoors village is Puddletown?
Read from the data: what stands out first, good and bad.
Puddletown’s strongest suit is the Dorset National Landscape close by. Where it falls short is how far some homes are from a park.
Puddletown grades D for the outdoors
Each chart is every UK town of 1,000 or more on one measure: the green bar is Puddletown, the dashed line the typical town. The number is the share of towns it beats; the five are averaged and the average ranked again.
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Graded, never part of the overall grade (like History and Civic life). It measures what is mapped: OS Open Greenspace leaves out woodland and open-access land that isn’t a park, and OpenStreetMap’s rural paths are more complete in some places than others.
Puddletown is 48th of 60 UK villages its size for the outdoors
The 60 UK towns and cities of 1,100 to 1,300 people with an Outdoors Grade. Hover a dot for its figures; tap one for its page.
Puddletown falls furthest behind on homes near a park, where 53 of the 59 others do better.
Show as a table
| Town | Outdoors | Green space | Near a park | Path per km² | Protected | |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| 1 | Porlock Somerset | A+ | 2.9 | 75% | 5.2 | 71% |
| 2 | Carlin How North Yorkshire | A+ | 3.1 | 100% | 2.3 | 13% |
| 3 | Sundridge Kent | A+ | 9.1 | 100% | 2.3 | 73% |
| 4 | Shamley Green Surrey | A | 2.9 | 100% | 3 | 69% |
| 5 | Dawlish Warren Devon | A | 21.1 | 73% | 2.9 | 1% |
| 6 | Niton Isle of Wight | A | 2.6 | 76% | 3.1 | 37% |
| 7 | Donisthorpe Leicestershire | A | 38.4 | 100% | 4.3 | 0% |
| 8 | Egloshayle Cornwall | A | 7.3 | 100% | 2.6 | 12% |
| 9 | Bures Suffolk | A | 5.4 | 100% | 2.5 | 14% |
| 10 | Ruardean Gloucestershire | A | 4.5 | 100% | 2.2 | 29% |
| 11 | Great Bedwyn Wiltshire | A | 3 | 76% | 3.7 | 100% |
| 12 | Brighstone Isle of Wight | A | 2.2 | 55% | 3.4 | 56% |
| 13 | Lower Halstow Kent | A− | 1.5 | 100% | 2.5 | 4% |
| 14 | Low Bradley North Yorkshire | A− | 1.2 | 100% | 6.2 | 2% |
| 15 | Hurst Green East Sussex | B+ | 2.3 | 100% | 1.1 | 100% |
| 16 | Oxspring South Yorkshire | B+ | 2.7 | 77% | 4 | 1% |
| 17 | Stallingborough Lincolnshire | B+ | 2.3 | 100% | 1.8 | 0% |
| 18 | King's Somborne Hampshire | B+ | 5.2 | 100% | 2.1 | 0% |
| 19 | St Bees Cumbria | B | 8.5 | 78% | 1.2 | 0% |
| 20 | Clyst St Mary Devon | B | 5.8 | 100% | 1.6 | 0% |
| 21 | Bodedern Gwynedd | B | 1.2 | 100% | 0 | 16% |
| 22 | Woodchurch Kent | B | 2.3 | 78% | 2.8 | 12% |
| 23 | Moresby Parks Cumbria | B− | 1.2 | 100% | 2 | 0% |
| 24 | Stradbroke Suffolk | B− | 3 | 100% | 1.8 | 0% |
| 25 | Trawden Lancashire | B− | 4 | 0% | 6.1 | 0% |
| 26 | Welford Northamptonshire | B− | 3.5 | 100% | 1.4 | 0% |
| 27 | Rushwick Worcestershire | B− | 5 | 71% | 2.8 | 0% |
| 28 | Datchworth Hertfordshire | C+ | 10.8 | 76% | 2.2 | 0% |
| 29 | Lyne Surrey | C+ | 4 | 71% | 3 | 0% |
| 30 | Tansley Derbyshire | C+ | 1.6 | 73% | 3.4 | 4% |
| 31 | Coldeast Devon | C+ | 1.6 | 47% | 3.6 | 30% |
| 32 | Haswell County Durham | C+ | 3.2 | 100% | 0.9 | 0% |
| 33 | Chesterton Oxfordshire | C+ | 1.8 | 100% | 2.2 | 0% |
| 34 | Bottom Boat West Yorkshire | C | 0.8 | 100% | 2.6 | 0% |
| 35 | Stalmine Lancashire | C | 3.1 | 67% | 0.8 | 0% |
| 36 | Rearsby Leicestershire | C | 1.5 | 100% | 1.9 | 0% |
| 37 | Barrington Cambridgeshire | C | 3.6 | 69% | 1.9 | 0% |
| 38 | Croughton Northamptonshire | C | 3.6 | 73% | 1.6 | 0% |
| 39 | Hill Brow and Rake Hampshire | C− | 0 | 0% | 2.9 | 97% |
| 40 | Wolverley Worcestershire | C− | 7.2 | 23% | 1.9 | 0% |
| 41 | Methley West Yorkshire | C− | 0.2 | 100% | 1.6 | 0% |
| 42 | Abbotskerswell Devon | C− | 4.2 | 49% | 1.4 | 0% |
| 43 | Kirby-le-Soken Essex | C− | 0.7 | 0% | 2.5 | 0% |
| 44 | Parson Drove Cambridgeshire | D | 3.5 | 60% | 0.9 | 0% |
| 45 | Shardlow Derbyshire | D | 1.5 | 73% | 2.3 | 0% |
| 46 | Kingswood Warwickshire | D | 1.7 | 42% | 2.7 | 0% |
| 47 | Coup Green Lancashire | D | 0.6 | 70% | 2.8 | 0% |
| 48 | Puddletown Dorset | D | 0.2 | 0% | 2.1 | 15% |
| 49 | Llanybydder Dyfed | D | 2.2 | 60% | 0.3 | 0% |
| 50 | Beckingham Nottinghamshire | D | 2.6 | 28% | 0.9 | 0% |
| 51 | Melton Constable Norfolk | D | 1.6 | 76% | 0.7 | 0% |
| 52 | Stoke Ferry Norfolk | D | 1.1 | 73% | 1.6 | 0% |
| 53 | Ifold West Sussex | D | 0 | 0% | 1.9 | 5% |
| 54 | Bretforton Worcestershire | D− | 0.2 | 0% | 1.4 | 9% |
| 55 | Standlake Oxfordshire | D− | 1.7 | 42% | 1.3 | 0% |
| 56 | Rillington North Yorkshire | D− | 1 | 75% | 0.6 | 0% |
| 57 | Wrawby Lincolnshire | D− | 1.8 | 26% | 0.8 | 0% |
| 58 | Darrington West Yorkshire | D− | 0.5 | 72% | 0.8 | 0% |
| 59 | Blackwell Worcestershire | D− | 0.7 | 29% | 2 | 0% |
| 60 | Fiskerton Lincolnshire | D− | 0 | 0% | 1.9 | 0% |
Parks, footpaths & countryside
Tap a number to zoom to a park. Tap a layer to hide it. The dashed line is Puddletown’s built-up area.
Few Puddletown residents live within a 5-minute walk of a park
Each square is 1 in 100 residents: green lives within 400 m of a public park, garden or playing field (Census 2021 output areas against OS Open Greenspace).
About 1,200 people live further than that. Playing fields count, so a park within reach isn’t always one with paths or trees.
The Dorset National Landscape is 1.4 mi away
Protected landscapes within 30 km, by direction and distance from the edge of the built-up area; circle size shows each one’s area. National Landscapes were called Areas of Outstanding Natural Beauty until 2023.
Dorset
Cranborne Chase & West Wiltshire Downs
15% of the land within 5 km of Puddletown is National Park or National Landscape, more than 74% of UK towns.
1 waymarked walk passes through or near Puddletown
15 km of footpaths, bridleways and rights of way are mapped in Puddletown and the kilometre around it, 2.1 km for every square kilometre (the typical UK town has 3.0). Bars show each route’s kilometres within 2 km of the village.
The regional route here is the The Hardy Way.
Waymarked walks are OpenStreetMap walking routes. Public rights of way are only as complete as the map in each area.
The best walking months in Puddletown: May to September
The village’s 1991–2020 averages (Met Office HadUK-Grid) and the daylight at its latitude. Outlined months have 12½+ hours of daylight, highs of 15 °C or more and little rain for the town.
| Jan | Feb | Mar | Apr | May | Jun | Jul | Aug | Sep | Oct | Nov | Dec | |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Daylight (h) | 8.4 | 9.9 | 11.7 | 13.7 | 15.5 | 16.5 | 16.1 | 14.5 | 12.5 | 10.6 | 8.9 | 8.0 |
| High (°C) | 8 | 9 | 11 | 14 | 17 | 20 | 22 | 21 | 19 | 15 | 11 | 9 |
| Rain (mm) | 125 | 86 | 72 | 68 | 59 | 59 | 59 | 81 | 76 | 121 | 128 | 125 |
June is the driest month (59 mm) and July the warmest (highs of 22 °C). Winter days are short, about 8 hours of daylight in December, and 128 mm of rain falls in November, the wettest month. Frost comes on about 43 nights a year. The climate in Puddletown →
Viewpoints, hills and nature near Puddletown
Mapped within 2 km of the village in OpenStreetMap, against the typical UK village its size per resident. Named places are listed with directions; unnamed ones are only counted.
The nearest beaches
Puddletown is inland. These are the nearest named beaches, measured from the edge of the village.
Check the water before you swim. The Environment Agency tests designated bathing waters from May to September and publishes a rating for each beach.
Every named place, with directions
Hills and peaks 4
Playgrounds 1
Plus 1 playground without a name on the map.
The outdoors in nearby towns
The nearest towns of 1,000+ within 12 miles. Tap a town for its outdoors page.
| Town | Outdoors | Green space, ha per 1,000 | Near a park | Protected within 5 km |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Puddletown | D | 0.2 | 0% | 15% |
| Milborne St Andrew 3.5 mi | B | 3.3 | 71% | 33% |
| Crossways 3.6 mi | C+ | 0.5 | 100% | 22% |
| Charlton Down 4.9 mi | A | 4.0 | 100% | 58% |
| Dorchester 5.1 mi | B | 1.6 | 78% | 53% |
| Charminster 5.1 mi | D | 0.3 | 0% | 56% |
| Bere Regis 5.5 mi | A | 39.2 | 100% | 0% |
Charlton Down, 4.9 miles away, grades A, the best next door: every resident lives within 400 m of a park. Milborne St Andrew, Crossways and Charlton Down have at least twice Puddletown’s green space per resident.
Questions about the outdoors in Puddletown
Is Puddletown near a National Park?
The nearest protected landscape is the Dorset National Landscape, 1.4 mi north-east of the village’s edge. It covers 1,129 km² and was designated in 1959.
What are the best walks near Puddletown?
1 waymarked walking route passes within 2 km of the village, including the The Hardy Way.
What is the nearest beach to Puddletown?
Ringstead Beach, 7.8 mi from the edge of the village, then Castle Cove (11 mi). Puddletown itself is inland.
How many people in Puddletown live near a park?
0% of residents live within 400 m, about a 5-minute walk, of a public park, garden or playing field (Census 2021 output areas against OS Open Greenspace). The typical UK town is 83%.
When is the best time of year for walking in Puddletown?
May to September: the longest days, the warmest afternoons and the least rain of the year, from the Met Office 1991–2020 averages.
Is Puddletown good for walking?
Paths are thinner than most towns: 2.1 km of footpath and right of way per square kilometre, more than 33% of UK towns. For park space per person it beats 2% (0.2 ha per 1,000 residents).
How is the Outdoors Grade worked out?
From five measures, each placed among UK towns of 1,000 or more: public green space per resident, the share living near a park, National Park or National Landscape within 5 km, footpaths per square kilometre, and the sea within 5 km. It is a character grade and isn’t part of Puddletown’s overall grade.
Where Puddletown’s outdoors figures come from
- Parks and green space: Ordnance Survey OS Open Greenspace (parks and gardens, playing fields, play spaces, and their access points). Contains OS data © Crown copyright and database right 2026, Open Government Licence v3.0.
- National Parks and National Landscapes: Natural England and Natural Resources Wales boundaries, areas and designation dates, Open Government Licence v3.0.
- Footpaths, walking routes, beaches and things to do: © OpenStreetMap contributors, Open Database License (ODbL), via Geofabrik, 16 October 2026.
- Historic parks, listed buildings and monuments: Historic England, National Heritage List for England, Open Government Licence v3.0.
- Rain and temperature: Met Office HadUK-Grid 1991–2020 averages for the town; daylight calculated from its latitude.
- The sea: ONS Countries (December 2024) boundaries clipped to mean high water. Residents near a park: ONS Census 2021 output areas.
- Grade: TownRatings’ Outdoors Grade, ranked against UK towns only.
Contains public sector information licensed under the Open Government Licence v3.0. Contains HM Land Registry data © Crown copyright and database right 2026. Contains OS data © Crown copyright and database right 2026 (ONS boundaries). Northern Ireland: Source: NISRA; contains Land & Property Services data and Ordnance Survey of Northern Ireland information, © Crown copyright, licensed under the Open Government Licence v3.0. Scotland: contains National Records of Scotland data, Registers of Scotland data and SEPA data, © Crown copyright / © SEPA 2025, licensed under the Open Government Licence v3.0.