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Filton Town Council is a parish council made up of thirteen councillors and forming the first tier of local government.
Filton was in Gloucestershire until 1974, when it became part of the newly formed county of Avon. When the Avon authority was abolished in 1996, the area became part of the unitary authority of South Gloucestershire and rejoined the ceremonial county of Gloucestershire.
Thousands of mites, farthings and other coins of the Roman emperors, Domitian, Constantine and Constans were found in a bank by some boys in 1880. Many of the coins were in excellent condition.
At the start of the 20th century, Filton was a small village, still detached from the city of Bristol to the south. Farming was the principal occupation. However, there was a large factory-like laundry in the village, opposite Filton House, owned by Samuel Shield. The Bristol to South Wales railway line passed through the village. There was a small station near the site of the current Abbey Wood station. A much larger railway station, known as Filton Junction, opened in 1910, after the alternate rail route from Bristol to London was finished. In 1907 the northern terminus for Bristol Tramways was moved out from Horfield to Filton. Tram production in the tramway sheds commenced in 1908. The manufacture of aeroplanes started in the Bristol Tramway sheds in 1910 and aero-engine production started in 1920.
Between the wars, Filton expanded rapidly to become a suburb of Bristol. Initially development (semi-detached housing) was concentrated on the western side of the A38, in an area known as Filton Park. In the 1930s, the area on the eastern side of the A38 started to be developed. Eventually, Filton became part of the Bristol conurbation, although it remained, as it does now, outside the city boundary. During the 1920s and 1930s, two infant/primary schools and one secondary school were built in Filton to accommodate the growing number of school-age children in the area. Many of these children were evacuated when World War II started in 1939, but returned later, during the Phoney War. Filton High School, originally a grammar school, but later a comprehensive, started to take pupils in 1960. In 2010 Filton High was demolished and replaced with Abbeywood Community School.
In the late 1940s, the main runway of Filton Aerodrome was greatly extended for the Bristol Brabazon project. Charlton village was demolished and the pre-war Filton bypass was severed. In the early 1960s, a new bypass was constructed, roughly parallel to the old one, and this later became part of the M5 motorway.
In the early 1950s the Bristol Aeroplane Company opened a purpose-built technical college to help train their apprentice intake. Attached to the college were also basic training workshops. In 1960 the education authority opened Filton Technical College on the opposite side of Filton Avenue to the BAC college. Later the various colleges merged and eventually became the South Gloucestershire and Stroud College.
Sandwiched between roads, factories, railway lines and the aerodrome, Filton expanded little after World War II. However, from the late 1970s a trading estate slowly developed on the eastern side of the Bristol/South Wales railway line in what is now known as East Filton. During the mid-1970s the A38 trunk road was upgraded to a dual carriageway. Station Road, a country lane in the early part of the 20th century, was also widened to become a dual carriageway and form part of the Avon Ring Road. In 1973, the Rolls-Royce car division was separated as Rolls-Royce Motors. Rolls-Royce (1971) Limited (the engine division) was privatised in 1987 as Rolls-Royce plc. Later, the Ministry of Defence set up a large office complex, known as Abbey Wood, in the same area.
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