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Albourne, West Sussex
The modern village of Albourne was originally two settlements; Albourne Street to the south and Albourne Green a little way to the north. The former is believed to have been created by the owner o Bishopshurst Manor with a number of houses laid out in equal sized plots along what is now called The Street. A number of buildings from the 16th and 17th century still survive here. A little to the north is Albourne Green centred around an old narrow green , of which the old pound still survives, that lies adjacent to the current road to Henfield. The small gap between the two was closed after the Second World War when the village expanded and was filled with small estates both privately and council built. To the north west on the Henfield Road is the scattered settlement of High Cross though most of the dwellings were constructed from the end of the 19th century onwards. Much of the rest of the parish is made up from scattered farms with a little ribbon development from after the First World War along Trusslers Hill Lane. However, the rural nature of the parish may come under threat from a proposed development to build a new town between the A23 and Henfield called Mayfields, though the exact nature of this development is yet to be finalised nor, at the time of writing in 2014, has any council agreed to it.
Two roads run through the parish in a north-south direction, along the eastern boundary is an old droving road from Newtimber into the Weald which in the early 19th century became the main London-Brighton turnpike which in turn became the A23 in the age of the car. The road was downgraded to the B2118 when the whole of the A23 was dualled and straightened north of Pyecombe to the M23 in the early 1990s. To the west part of the parish boundary runs along the minor road that runs from Poynings Crossways to High Cross that is known as Shaves Wood Lane in the south and Trusslers Hill Lane at the northern end. The route continues northwards via Twineham Lane to Twineham and Bolney. The current main east-west route runs from Albourne Green from the old A23 to the A281 at Lidds Hill north of Henfield. Though old this route replaced a much older route than originally ran along Church Lane past the church through the hamlet of Blackstone in neighbouring Woodmancote parish before entering Henfield via Furners Lane. By Yeakell & Gardner's 1778-83 map much of this route was little more than footpaths. At High cross another road, Reeds Lane, branches off and heads east to Sayers Common. In the early 19th century the lane was given its own tollhouse at the western end to stop travellers getting on the main London-Brighton turnpike for free. The highway is still used as a rat run today for those coming from the west wishing to get on the A23. At the very southern end of the parish is Muddleswood Road, the current B2117, which dates from the early 19th century and was designed to link the old London-Brighton turnpike with the new one that later became the A23.
The main waterway through the parish is Cutler's Brook from which the parish derives its name, 'stream next to the alder trees', which is a tributary of the River Adur which it joins north of Henfield, A number of minor streams head northwards from the spring line on the Downs to join it with the stream able to power a couple of mills during the medieval period. A couple of minor streams to the north feed into another Adur tributary, Herring Brook which runs through neighbouring Hurspierpoint and Twineham parishes.
The village still retains its primary school which opened in 1844 and moved to its current site in 1961, however, it lost its post office and village store in 1977, local residents having to make the trip to neighbouring Hurstpierpoint, Henfield or Burgess Hill for shopping trips. The village pub, the Kings Head stood on the main London-Brighton road opposite the junction with the road to Hurspierpoint. It was rebuilt in 1938 and remained in use until the late 1990s when it closed down and is now offices for a software engineering firm.
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