page_title: Chippenham
section_title: Economy
hierarchical_section_title: Chippenham / Economy
caption_attribution_description: English: Chippenham high street
context_page_description: Chippenham is a market town in northwest Wiltshire, England. It lies 20 miles east of Bristol, 86 miles west of London and 4 miles west of The Cotswolds AONB. The town was established on a crossing of the River Avon and some form of settlement is believed to have existed there since before Roman times. It was a royal vill, and probably a royal hunting lodge, under Alfred the Great. The town continued to grow when the Great Western Railway arrived in 1841; it is now a major commuter town.
  Chippenham is twinned with La Flèche in France and Friedberg in Germany. The town's motto is "Unity and Loyalty".
context_section_description: Historically a market town, Chippenham's economy has since changed to that of a commuter town with residents travelling to workplaces in Bath, Bristol, Swindon and even London (almost 100 miles to the east).
  Several large businesses have been located in the region, with the biggest former employer being Westinghouse, now owned by Siemens, whose factory complex lies next to the railway station. The company undertakes railway signalling contracts for Network Rail, London Underground as well as railway operators in other parts of the world, e.g. Beijing Subway, Oslo Public Transport Administration, SMRT Corporation, Kowloon-Canton Railway Corporation, MTR Corporation and many others. Parts of the Westinghouse site are occupied by a range of companies. There are a number of other industrial sites around the town, Bumpers Farm being the largest.
  In 2005, Wincanton PLC, Europe's second-largest logistics organisation, consolidated its head office operations and moved to the newly developed Methuen Park office development in west Chippenham, where it employs around 350 people.
caption: Chippenham High Street featured a co-operative department store (now Wilko, left foreground)
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