Business events in Eastleigh

Named by the railway

Eastleigh is a young town, and a railway one. The borough council's heritage paper counts fewer than 200 inhabitants in 1851. The London to Southampton line opened in 1840 with a station called Bishopstoke Junction. Eastleigh Borough Council's heritage paper explains what came next: in 1889 the London and South Western Railway bought land east of the station and laid 26 miles of extra sidings, and in 1890 to 1891 its carriage and wagon works opened on about 40 acres, moved down from Nine Elms in London. The company began calling the station Eastleigh because travellers kept confusing Bishopstoke with Basingstoke.

The locomotive works followed, taking a further 30 acres. Under the Southern Railway from 1923, Eastleigh became the main centre for building and overhauling engines. The carriage works closed in 1967, the locomotive works in 2005, though the council notes that rail work on the site has since resumed. Campbell Road, built for railway workers, is still valued for its link to that history.

The town today

The ONS counted 48,360 people in the Eastleigh built-up area at the 2021 Census. The heritage paper describes the town as the largest settlement in the borough, running out into Chandler's Ford, Bishopstoke and Boyatt Wood, and it is the one part of the borough with no parish council of its own.

Across Eastleigh borough the ONS counted 5,350 enterprises in its 2026 UK Business Counts. That is the figure for the whole borough, including Chandler's Ford, Hedge End and Hamble.

Airport, freeport and the motorways

The borough's other long story is flying. Its heritage paper records the first flight from North Stoneham Farm in 1910, Southampton Municipal Airport opening in 1932, and the first prototype Spitfire taking off there in 1936. The new Southampton Airport opened in 1994.

The newest part of the local economy is around that airport. The Solent Freeport describes Navigator Quarter as a 100-acre tax site alongside Southampton Airport and the University of Southampton Science Park, with Southampton Airport Parkway station next door, London Waterloo around 66 minutes away by rail, and the M27 and M3 within five miles.

Events here

We have pages for Holiday Inn Southampton - Eastleigh and Holiday Inn Southampton-Eastleigh M3 Jct13, as organisers have listed them. Nearby towns with their own pages include Chandler's Ford, Southampton and Hamble; the Southampton and the Solent page brings them together.