After a year of cataloguing, the Crawley New Town archive is now available to the public at West Sussex Record Office. It is the first time these 3000+ records have been fully accessible, and researchers can search the catalogue online via our website.

The nucleus of the archive is the 80+ volumes of minutes and 64 volumes of board papers. These minutes and board papers give us an account of every decision that went into planning and developing the New Town. They also include copies of reports, surveys, and architectural plans which were submitted to the board by various Corporation departments.

Complementing these volumes are over 700 files of administrative paperwork covering every aspect of the New Town between 1946 and 1982. These files were kept and maintained by the Corporation, and when they were wound-up in 1962, the Commission of the New Towns did the same. Before coming to WSRO, they were kept by Homes England in centralised storage. The contents of the files range from correspondence to reports to copies of plans, photos, and ephemera. Researchers should find these particularly useful for details on infrastructure and social life in the new town.

Then there are a significant number of maps and architectural plans. These include the Master Plan map as well as various others showing farm units, gas services, and electricity lines. There is a series of architectural plans of house types, neighbourhoods, the town centre, and more; there are also copies of plans in the run of board papers.

More than 800 photographs (in various formats such as glass negatives, slides, and prints) and they document the construction of the New Town, as well as schools, civic buildings, housing, neighbourhoods, Manor Royal, and the town centre. They span 1949 to the 1980s and are excellent as a tool for researching architecture and town planning, but also for igniting memories of living in the New Town for past and present residents.

Land disposal volumes list the names and addresses of early New Town residents, and will be especially useful to family historians now and in the future. There are also terriers of land ownership and of land acquisitions detailing residents whose land was sought by the Corporation.