Photo: Michael Garlick · CC BY-SA 2.0

Outdoors in Locks Heath · parks, paths & countryside

Locks Heath is on the coast, on the King Charles III England Coast Path

The sea makes up 22% of the area within 5 km. The New Forest National Park begins 1.3 mi from the town’s edge. Parks and playing fields in Locks Heath add up to 3.5 ha for every 1,000 residents; the typical UK town has 2.1. Locks Heath grades A+ for the outdoors: #9 of 76 in Hampshire. A character grade: it isn’t part of the overall grade.

8named parks 1.3 mito New Forest 5waymarked walks

Green space

3.5 ha

per 1,000 residents

Typical UK town 2.1

Near a park

91%

of residents within 400 m

Typical UK town 83%

Footpaths

148 km

3.7 km per km², town + 1 km

Typical UK town 3.0 per km²

Protected landscape

of the land within 5 km

Nearest: New Forest National Park

The sea

22%

of the area within 5 km

A coastal town

Character

What kind of outdoors town is Locks Heath?

Read from the data: what stands out first, good and bad.

On the coast22% of the area within 5 km is sea; 21 beaches mapped.Countryside both waysNew Forest starts 1.3 mi south-west, South Downs 3.4 mi north-east.Room to roam3.5 ha of parks and playing fields per 1,000 residents, more than 76% of UK towns.A town of footpaths3.7 km of path per km², more than 75% of UK towns. The typical town has 3.0.

Locks Heath’s strongest suit is the sea, followed by two protected landscapes close by.

Outdoors grade

Locks Heath grades A+ for the outdoors

Each chart is every UK town of 1,000 or more on one measure: the green bar is Locks Heath, the dashed line the typical town. The number is the share of towns it beats; the five are averaged and the average ranked again.

A⁺

Better than 98% of UK towns#9 of 76 in Hampshire · 1st of 60 UK towns its size

Public green space3.5 haper 1,000 residents: parks, gardens, playing fields, play spaces

77out of
100

A park within a walk91%of residents within 400 m (a 5-minute walk)

69out of
100

National Park or National Landscape4%of the land within 5 km

67out of
100

Footpaths3.7 kmper km², the town and 1 km around it

75out of
100

The sea22%of the area within 5 km

90out of
100

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.

Towns its size

Locks Heath is 1st of 60 UK towns its size for the outdoors

The 60 UK towns and cities of 32,300 to 39,300 people with an Outdoors Grade. Hover a dot for its figures; tap one for its page.

Outdoors score: the share of UK towns each one beats

Footpath, km per km²

Locks Heath3.7

Towns its size3.9

Hampshire towns3.3

All UK towns3.0

Green space, ha per 1,000 residents

Locks Heath3.5

Towns its size2.4

Hampshire towns2.8

All UK towns2.1

Residents within 400 m of a park

Locks Heath91%

Towns its size84%

Hampshire towns80%

All UK towns83%

Against towns its size, Locks Heath stands out most for park space per resident: only 12 of the other 59 have more.

Show as a table

	Town	Outdoors	Green space	Near a park	Path per km²	Protected
1	Locks Heath Hampshire	A⁺	3.5	91%	3.7	4%
2	Great Malvern Worcestershire	A⁺	3.9	90%	6	38%
3	Dover Kent	A⁺	3	86%	2.9	29%
4	Hyde Greater Manchester	A	4.3	91%	3.9	1%
5	Epsom Surrey	A	5.7	80%	4.8	2%
6	Burgess Hill West Sussex	A	2.4	87%	5	27%
7	Skelmersdale Lancashire	A	7.8	91%	5.4	0%
8	Ilkeston Derbyshire	A	3.7	98%	5	0%
9	Redhill Surrey	A⁻	2.2	91%	4.3	14%
10	Rustington West Sussex	A⁻	2.1	78%	2.7	25%
11	Dunstable Bedfordshire	A⁻	2	78%	8	29%
12	Sutton in Ashfield Nottinghamshire	A⁻	4.3	94%	4	0%
13	Caversham Berkshire	A⁻	2.5	77%	4.3	32%
14	Accrington Lancashire	A⁻	2.6	79%	5.6	0%
15	Nelson Lancashire	A⁻	1.8	85%	5.2	15%
16	St Neots Cambridgeshire	A⁻	3.5	91%	4.4	0%
17	Didcot Oxfordshire	A⁻	1.6	88%	3.8	39%
18	Exmouth Devon	A⁻	1.4	82%	2.6	21%
19	Leyland Lancashire	B⁺	4.6	91%	3.4	0%
20	Waterlooville Hampshire	B⁺	1	66%	5.2	18%
21	Chippenham Wiltshire	B⁺	2.8	76%	3.9	7%
22	Fulwood Lancashire	B⁺	3.5	87%	3.9	0%
23	Swadlincote Derbyshire	B⁺	4.1	84%	3.8	0%
24	Fleet Hampshire	B⁺	3.3	79%	5.5	0%
25	Lichfield Staffordshire	B⁺	2.7	82%	3.1	2%
26	Pudsey West Yorkshire	B⁺	1.9	94%	5.1	0%
27	Hucknall Nottinghamshire	B⁺	3	87%	4	0%
28	Aberdare Mid Glamorgan	B⁺	4.6	84%	1.8	19%
29	Hitchin Hertfordshire	B⁺	1.5	83%	4.4	10%
30	Rowley Regis West Midlands	B⁺	4.1	71%	5.5	0%
31	West Bridgford Nottinghamshire	B⁺	2.2	86%	7.7	0%
32	Brighouse West Yorkshire	B	2.5	91%	3.8	0%
33	Wigston Leicestershire	B	2.9	88%	3.6	0%
34	Billingham County Durham	B	4.7	86%	2.9	0%
35	Whitley Bay Tyne and Wear	B	1.9	82%	2.9	0%
36	Warwick Warwickshire	B	3	85%	3.8	0%
37	Denton Greater Manchester	B	2.4	88%	4.2	0%
38	Letchworth Hertfordshire	B	2.2	85%	4.8	0%
39	Loughton Essex	B	2.9	74%	5.5	0%
40	Abingdon-on-Thames Oxfordshire	B	2.1	91%	3.9	0%
41	Bicester Oxfordshire	B	2.1	99%	3.2	0%
42	Prescot Merseyside	B	3.5	94%	2.4	0%
43	Chadderton Greater Manchester	B	1.9	87%	4.6	0%
44	Caerphilly Gwent	B	2.6	82%	3.8	0%
45	Morecambe Lancashire	B⁻	0.8	84%	2.2	2%
46	Redcar North Yorkshire	B⁻	2.6	79%	1.9	0%
47	Canvey Island Essex	B⁻	1.5	86%	2.3	0%
48	Tonbridge Kent	B⁻	2.1	65%	2.6	38%
49	Camberley Surrey	C⁺	2	73%	4.8	0%
50	Billericay Essex	C⁺	4.1	70%	3	0%
51	Winsford Cheshire	C⁺	1.3	92%	3.9	0%
52	Pontefract West Yorkshire	C⁺	2.6	84%	2.6	0%
53	New Haw, West Byfleet and Sheerwater Surrey	C⁺	2.2	69%	4.1	0%
54	Morley West Yorkshire	C⁺	1.2	87%	3.9	0%
55	Horndean Hampshire	C⁺	0.9	57%	3.3	53%
56	Long Eaton Derbyshire	C	1.8	74%	3.6	0%
57	Rayleigh Essex	C	2	71%	3.1	0%
58	Bridlington East Riding of Yorkshire	C	0.8	80%	1.8	0%
59	Bilston West Midlands	C⁻	1.5	76%	2.9	0%
60	Bromsgrove Worcestershire	C⁻	1.4	75%	2.6	0%

The map

Parks, footpaths & countryside

Tap a number to zoom to a park. Tap a layer to hide it. The dashed line is Locks Heath’s built-up area.

Green space: parks, gardens, playing fields and play spaces, named or not.© OpenStreetMap contributors · Contains OS data © Crown copyright · Natural England / NRW

Places to walk

Parks to walk in, in and around Locks Heath

The biggest is River Hamble Country Park, 164 ha (405 acres). Directions go to the park’s nearest public entrance where Ordnance Survey maps one.

All 8 named parks by size: 210 ha (518 acres) and 26 km of path

Parks & gardens 203 haPlaying fields 6.6 haPlay spaces 0.1 ha

The two biggest, River Hamble Country Park and Holly Hill Woodland Park, are 96% of the named green space and carry 25 km of path between them. 5 of the 8 are under 2 ha: small gardens, play spaces and pitches.

Locks Heath’s biggest

River Hamble Country Park

Park or garden · 290 m outside town

164 ha (405 acres)18.0 km of path

4 hto walk all 18 km of path

230 pitchesfootball pitches would fit

2.4 mi north-westfrom the centre

Tanhouse Lane

Directionsto the nearest entrance

Holly Hill Woodland Park

Park or garden

37 ha (91 acres)7.0 km of path

1 h 35 minto walk all 7 km of path

51 pitchesfootball pitches would fit

0.9 mi westfrom the centre

Nature reserve

Directionsto the nearest entrance

Priory Park

Playing field

3.2 ha (8 acres)0.6 km of path

5 minto walk all 0.6 km of path

4 pitchesfootball pitches would fit

0.5 mi westfrom the centre

Directionsto the nearest entrance

Yew Tree Woodland Park

Park or garden · 140 m outside town

1.1 ha (3 acres)0.4 km of path

1.2 mi northfrom the centre

Directionsto the nearest entrance

Barry's Meadow

Park or garden

1.2 ha (3 acres)0.1 km of path

2 pitchesfootball pitches would fit

1.8 mi south-eastfrom the centre

Directionsto the nearest entrance

Warsash Recreation Ground

Playing field

1.5 ha (4 acres)0.1 km of path

2 pitchesfootball pitches would fit

1.4 mi south-westfrom the centre

Directionsto the nearest entrance

Sarisbury Green

Playing field

1.9 ha (5 acres)

3 pitchesfootball pitches would fit

1.2 mi north-westfrom the centre

Directionsto the nearest entrance

King George V Play Area

Play space

0.1 ha (0 acres)

0.5 mi southfrom the centre

Directionsto the park

Close to home

9 in 10 Locks Heath 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).

Within 400 m (91%)Further (9%)

Locks Heath91%

Towns its size84%

Hampshire towns80%

All UK towns83%

About 3,000 people live further than that. Playing fields count, so a park within reach isn’t always one with paths or trees; 66 playgrounds are mapped in and around the town, about one for every 542 residents.

National Parks & National Landscapes

New Forest and South Downs both start about 3 miles from Locks Heath

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.

National ParkNational LandscapeThe 5 km the grade counts

National Park

New Forest

1.3 mi south-west567 km²since 20064% of the land within 5 km

Official site

National Park

South Downs

3.4 mi north-east1,653 km²since 2010

Official site

National Landscape

Isle Of Wight

5.1 mi south191 km²since 1963

Official site

National Landscape

Chichester Harbour

11 mi east73 km²since 1964

Official site

4% of the land within 5 km of Locks Heath is National Park or National Landscape, more than 66% of UK towns. New Forest National Park covers 567 km² and has been a National Park since 2006.

Footpaths & waymarked walks

Locks Heath is on the King Charles III England Coast Path

148 km of footpaths, bridleways and rights of way are mapped in Locks Heath and the kilometre around it, 3.7 km for every square kilometre (the typical UK town has 3.0). Bars show each route’s kilometres within 2 km of the town.

NationalRegionalLocal

Strawberry Trail14.3 km

King Charles III England Coast Path: Calshot to Gosport11.5 km

European walking route E9, Milford on Sea to Queen Elizabeth Country Park11.3 km

Solent Way11.3 km

Hamble Rail Trail Route3.9 km

The King Charles III England Coast Path, a national route, passes Locks Heath. Close to home, the Strawberry Trail has 14 km of local walk within 2 km of the town. The regional route here is the Solent Way.

Waymarked walks are OpenStreetMap walking routes. Public rights of way are only as complete as the map in each area.

When to get out

The best walking months in Locks Heath: May to September

The town’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	8.8	8.0
High (°C)	9	9	12	15	18	21	23	22	20	16	12	9
Rain (mm)	92	65	56	55	47	55	53	61	69	96	103	103

May is the driest month (47 mm) and July the warmest (highs of 23 °C). Winter days are short, about 8 hours of daylight in December, and 103 mm of rain falls in November, the wettest month. Frost comes on about 27 nights a year. The climate in Locks Heath →

The coast

The coast and beaches near Locks Heath

22% of the area within 5 km of Locks Heath is sea. 21 beaches are mapped within 5 km, 2 with a name.

Hill Head Beach2.1 mi from town

Directions

Calshot Beach2.1 mi from town

Directions

The King Charles III England Coast Path passes the town.

Sea: the area outside the ONS coastline (mean high water). Bathing water quality is published by the Environment Agency (England) and Natural Resources Wales; check it before swimming.

Things to do

3 viewpoints and 66 playgrounds

Mapped within 2 km of the town in OpenStreetMap, against the typical UK town its size per resident. Named places are listed with directions; unnamed ones are only counted.

3Viewpoints2.8× towns its size 2Hills and peaks 2Waterfalls 7Nature reserves3.3× towns its size 9Picnic sites8.8× towns its size 66Playgrounds1.6× towns its size 1Dog parks 1Campsites 6Slipways

Every named place, with directions

Viewpoints 3

Plus 3 viewpoints without a name on the map.

Hills and peaks 2

Hill Top41 m (135 ft) · 0.9 mi from town

Directions

Plus 1 peak without a name on the map.

Waterfalls 2

Plus 2 waterfalls without a name on the map.

Nature reserves 7

Holly Hill Woodland Park Local Nature Reserve28 ha · 0.0 mi from town

Directions

Warsash Common Local Nature Reserve26 ha · 0.1 mi from town

Directions

Mustang Avenue Nature Reserve1.9 ha · 0.1 mi from town

Directions

Swanwick Lakes0.3 mi from town

Directions

Mercury Marshes Local Nature Reserve6.1 ha · 0.4 mi from town

Directions

Berry Coppice9.9 ha · 0.6 mi from town

Directions

Plus 1 nature reserve without a name on the map.

Picnic sites 9

Plus 9 picnic sites without a name on the map.

Playgrounds 66

Badgers Copse play areain town

Directions

Compass Way Playgroundin town

Directions

Course Park Crescent Play Areain town

Directions

Kites Croft Play Areain town

Directions

Longacres Play Areain town

Directions

Caraway play area0.5 mi from town

Directions

Saffron Way play area0.6 mi from town

Directions

Coriander Way play area0.7 mi from town

Directions

Plus 58 playgrounds without a name on the map.

Dog parks 1

Stanleys Meadow0.8 mi from town

Directions

Campsites 1

Paulines Lodge Scout activity centre0.7 mi from town

Directions

Slipways 6

Plus 6 slipways without a name on the map.

Next door

The outdoors in nearby towns

The nearest towns of 1,000+ within 12 miles. Tap a town for its outdoors page.

WhiteleyHamble-le-RiceBursledonKnowleFarehamNetleyLocks Heath

ABCDOutdoors Grade

Town	Outdoors	Green space, ha per 1,000	Near a park	Protected within 5 km
Locks Heath	A⁺	3.5	91%	4%
Whiteley 1.6 mi	A⁻	3.0	52%	2%
Hamble-le-Rice 2.3 mi	A⁺	12.7	67%	7%
Bursledon 2.7 mi	A	2.6	90%	0%
Knowle 3.2 mi	A⁻	2.0	100%	7%
Fareham 3.4 mi	B	1.1	48%	2%
Netley 3.4 mi	A⁺	16.3	100%	4%

Netley, 3.4 miles away, grades A+, the best next door: every resident lives within 400 m of a park. Hamble-le-Rice and Netley have at least twice Locks Heath’s green space per resident.

Questions about the outdoors in Locks Heath

What is the biggest park in Locks Heath?

River Hamble Country Park, 164 ha (405 acres), with 18 km of path, just outside the built-up area. Holly Hill Woodland Park (37 ha) is second. 8 named parks, gardens and playing fields are in the town or within 400 m of it.

Is Locks Heath near a National Park?

Yes. New Forest National Park begins 1.3 mi south-west of the town’s edge. It covers 567 km² and has been a National Park since 2006.

What are the best walks near Locks Heath?

5 waymarked walking routes pass within 2 km of the town, including the Strawberry Trail, King Charles III England Coast Path: Calshot to Gosport and European walking route E9, Milford on Sea to Queen Elizabeth Country Park. River Hamble Country Park alone has 18 km of path.

How many people in Locks Heath live near a park?

91% 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 Locks Heath?

May to September: the longest days, the warmest afternoons and the least rain of the year, from the Met Office 1991–2020 averages.

Is Locks Heath good for walking?

For paths, yes: 3.7 km of footpath and right of way per square kilometre, more than 75% of UK towns. For park space per person it beats 77% (3.5 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 Locks Heath’s overall grade.

Sources

Where Locks Heath’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.