Cotswold District

51°43′08″N 1°58′05″W / 51.719°N 1.968°W / 51.719; -1.968

Cotswold District
Non-metropolitan district
Cirencester, the administrative centre of the Cotswold District
Cotswold shown within Gloucestershire
Sovereign state	United Kingdom
Constituent country	England
Region	South West England
Non-metropolitan county	Gloucestershire
Status	Non-metropolitan district
Admin HQ	Cirencester
Incorporated	1 April 1974
Government
• Type	Non-metropolitan district council
• Body	Cotswold District Council
• MPs	Geoffrey Clifton-Brown
Area
• Total	449.6 sq mi (1,164.5 km2)
• Rank	20th (of 296)
Population  (2022)
• Total	91,311
• Rank	260th (of 296)
• Density	200/sq mi (78/km2)
Ethnicity (2021) [1]
• Ethnic groups	List 96.3% White 1.5% Mixed 1.3% Asian 0.4% Black 0.4% other
Religion (2021) [1]
• Religion	List 55.7% Christianity 36.7% no religion 7.3% other 0.3% Islam
Time zone	UTC0 (GMT)
• Summer (DST)	UTC+1 (BST)
ONS code	23UC (ONS) E07000079 (GSS)
OS grid reference	SP0221002304

Cotswold is a local government district in Gloucestershire, England. It is named after the wider Cotswolds region and range of hills. The council is based in the district's largest town of Cirencester. The district also includes the towns of Chipping Campden, Fairford, Lechlade, Moreton-in-Marsh, Northleach, Stow-on-the-Wold and Tetbury, along with numerous villages and surrounding rural areas.

In 2021 the district had a population of 91,125. The district covers nearly 450 square miles (1,200 km²), with some 80% of the land located within the Cotswolds Area of Outstanding Natural Beauty.^[2][3] The much larger area referred to as the Cotswolds encompasses nearly 800 square miles, spanning five counties: Gloucestershire, Oxfordshire, Warwickshire, Wiltshire, and Worcestershire.^[4][5] This large Area of Outstanding Natural Beauty had a population of 139,000 in 2016.^[6]

Eighty per cent of the district lies within the River Thames catchment area, with the Thames itself and several tributaries including the River Windrush and River Leach running through the district. Lechlade is an important point on the river as the upstream limit of navigation. In the 2007 floods in the UK, rivers were the source of flooding of 53 per cent of the locations affected and the Thames at Lechlade reached record levels with over 100 reports of flooding.^[7]

The neighbouring districts are South Gloucestershire, Stroud, Tewkesbury, Cheltenham, Wychavon, Stratford-on-Avon, West Oxfordshire, Vale of White Horse, Swindon and Wiltshire.