The fair fills Ock Street, High Street and the Market Place on Monday 5 and Tuesday 6 October. Every road closure, the 7.5 tonne ban and the Runaway Fair date.

The Abingdon Michaelmas Fair is on Monday 5 and Tuesday 6 October 2026, noon to 11pm on both days. It fills the Market Place, the High Street, The Square and the whole length of Ock Street, which is why Abingdon Town Council calls it the longest street fair in Europe.

The date is not a choice anyone makes each year. The town council’s own fairs page states the rule: “By law, the Michaelmas fair must take place annually on the Monday and Tuesday falling first before the 11 October.” In 2026, 11 October is a Sunday, so the fair lands on the 5th and the 6th.

Read the county council’s order, not the town council’s pages

If you search for this fair you will land on Abingdon Town Council’s news article about it. Check the date at the top: it was published in October 2019. The council’s separate Michaelmas and Runaway fairs page carries no 2026 dates at all, and the “this year’s” dates it does give, Monday 10 and Tuesday 11 October plus Monday 17 October for the Runaway Fair, were last correct in 2022. The only document written for this year is Oxfordshire County Council’s traffic order.

That order, the Oxfordshire County Council (Abingdon Michaelmas Fair) (Special Event) Order 2026, is published in full on the county council’s large public events pages. It defines the event as “the Abingdon Michaelmas Fair from 4-7 October 2026” and comes into force on 4 October. The accompanying statement of reasons, dated 27 August 2026 and referenced S26-020, says the restrictions “will apply from 4 to 7 October 2026 inclusive”.

Those four days are the traffic management window, not the fair itself. Sunday 4 October is build-up, Wednesday 7 October is the pull-down. The rides run on the Monday and the Tuesday.

What closes, and when

Five stretches of road are closed to traffic under Schedule 1 of the order.

Road From To When
Market Place, north side of County Hall Stert Street junction High Street junction While signs are in place
High Street and The Square Market Place junction Ock Street junction While signs are in place
Ock Street The Square junction Drayton Road and Spring Road junction Midday to midnight daily, access permitted midnight to midday
Stratton Way Ock Street junction Bath Street junction Midday to midnight daily, access permitted midnight to midday
West St Helen Street High Street junction Lombard Street junction While signs are in place

The Ock Street and Stratton Way entries are the ones worth reading twice. Both carry a nightly release: the order permits access between midnight and midday, so the fair closure bites from noon each day and lifts after the rides stop.

Waiting is banned outright on four more stretches, all of them the streets people use to dodge the town centre: Bostock Road on both sides from Conduit Road to Victoria Road, the north side of Edward Street from Victoria Road to Spring Road, the west side of Victoria Road from 40 metres north of Ock Street to Exbourne Road, and the west side of Spring Road from the A415 Marcham Road to Faringdon Road.

Two roads reverse or fix their direction for the fair. Lombard Street runs west to east only, and St Helens Wharf Bridge runs east to west only.

Lorries are banned from four entrances

Vehicles over 7.5 tonnes may not enter Abingdon from any of these points while the order is in force:

  • The A415 Abingdon Bridge
  • Southwards at the Oxford Road roundabout
  • Southwards at the Wootton Road roundabout
  • Westwards along Radley Road from Audlett Drive

The exemptions in the order are narrow and worth knowing if you live inside the closure. Nothing in it stops a vehicle used by the police, fire or ambulance services, a marked Royal Mail vehicle using Ock Street, a vehicle setting up or dismantling the fair, or a vehicle “requiring access to property only accessible via the closed road(s)”.

Parking and buses

Every town centre car park sits outside the closed streets, but Stratton Way is one of the roads that shuts at midday, so approach from Bath Street or the Vineyard side rather than driving up Ock Street. Tariffs, the free first hour and the three car parks that charge on Sundays are all on our Abingdon parking page.

Bus diversions had not been published when this page was written. Oxford Bus Company’s service updates page, read on 5 September 2026, carried a full diversion notice for Oxford’s St Giles Fair and nothing at all for the Abingdon fairs. Diversions for services 33, 35, 44 and X2 usually appear on that page in the week before. Anything else affecting your journey is on our Abingdon roadworks and travel page.

The Runaway Fair, a week later

The Runaway Fair is the smaller second fair, held on the Monday one week after the Michaelmas Fair. The town council explains the name: it was the chance for anyone hired at the Michaelmas Fair who found their new master cruel or the work intolerable to “literally run away and find another place to work”.

The expected 2026 date is Monday 12 October. Treat that as expected rather than confirmed. No first-party source has published it: the town council’s fairs page has not been updated and the county council’s order covers only the Michaelmas Fair. The listings site The Oxford Magazine gives 12 October, noon to 11pm, which follows the town council’s own “a week after” rule. We will replace this with a confirmed date when one of the councils publishes it.

Why the fair exists at all

Both fairs began as hiring fairs after the Black Death of 1348, when the population fell by more than 40 per cent and workers could suddenly go looking for a better master. The town council’s account describes skilled workers carrying the tools of their trade over one shoulder and unskilled workers carrying a mop instead, which is where the name mop fair comes from. It stayed a hiring fair in part until the early twentieth century.

Both fairs are run by Bob Wilsons Fun Fairs.

Sources