Visit England - Kingston upon Thames

<body>  <p>Central Kingston is a busy predominantly retail centre, with a small number of commercial offices and civic buildings. It has a great many car parks, connected by a notoriously difficult one-way system. It is one of the main centres of the south west London bus network, and it is connected to Twickenham, Richmond, Wimbledon, and London Waterloo by overground train. Kingston Bridge with John Lewis in the background.Shopping is well catered for and is generally towards the upper end of expectations, with a good mixture of familiar High Street chains and more select boutiques. The shopping centre includes a shopping mall, "The Bentall Centre", containing the Bentalls department store and large branches of chain stores found in many British high streets. There is a large branch of the John Lewis department store group, with a Waitrose supermarket, located in the basement. The Rotunda, located in the former Bentalls furniture depository building (a local landmark), includes a bowling alley, fitness centre, a 14-screen Odeon multiplex cinema and some restaurants. Recent developments along the riverside south of Kingston Bridge have added bars, restaurants and a theatre, the Rose Theatre which opened in 2008 with Sir Peter Hall as the director. The ancient market is still held daily in the Market Place. Kingston's civic buildings include the Guildhall which houses Kingston Council and the magistrates' court, There is also the county court, a local museum and public library. A short distance away is the new crown court building, adjacent to the County Hall Building which houses the main offices of Surrey County Council. Until local government re-organisation in 1965 when Kingston became one of the 33 boroughs of Greater London, it was the County Town of Surrey. Guildford now has this title as Kingston is no longer administered by Surrey. Plans to move these offices to Woking have been scrapped. Kingston's main open space is the River Thames, with its lively frontage of bars and restaurants. Downstream there is a walk through Canbury Gardens towards Teddington Lock. Upstream there is a promenade crossing the Hogsmill river and reaching almost to Surbiton. Across Kingston Bridge is a tree lined river bank fronting the expanse of Hampton Court Park. One of the more unusual sights in Kingston is several disused red telephone boxes that have been tipped up to lean against one another in an arrangement resembling dominoes. This sculpture by David Mach was commissioned in 1988 as part of the landscaping for the new Relief Road, and is called Out of Order. </p> <h2>Sport </h2> <p>Kingston is the home of two non-league Association football clubs, Kingstonian F.C. and AFC Wimbledon, both of which play at the Kingsmeadow Stadium. Kingston Athletic Club and Polytechnic Harriers - as of 2009, competing in the National Two division of the British Athetics League - are based at the neighbouring Kingsmeadow athetics stadium. Kingston Rugby Club is based on the outskirts of the town and Kingston Rowing Club is based on the River Thames. Kingston Regatta takes place on the river at the town in July. </p> <h2> Eating and drinking </h2> <p>Kingston has many pubs and restaurants, though several public houses in centre have closed in recent years to become restaurants or bars. The more traditional pubs tend to be in the northern part of the town (Canbury) and include the Park Tavern, Wych Elm and Willoughby Arms. Further south are found the Druid's Head, the Spring Grove, and several small local pubs around Fairfield. The Druid's Head is notable as one of the first taverns to make the famous dessert syllabub in the 18th century. There are several Chinese, Indian, Thai and Italian restaurants. </p> <p>Text is available under the <a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wikipedia:Text_of_Creative_Commons_Attribution-ShareAlike_3.0_Unported_License">Creative Commons Attribution/Share-Alike License</a></p>  <script src="http://www.google-analytics.com/urchin.js" type="text/javascript"></script> <script type="text/javascript"> _uacct = "UA-119091-1"; urchinTracker(); </script> </body>