Shaftesbury is a town as well as civil parish in Dorset, England. It is located on the A30 road, 20 miles (32 kilometres) west of Salisbury, near to the border with Wiltshire. It is the only substantial hill negotiation in Dorset, being developed regarding 215 metres (705 ft) above sea level on a greensand hillside on the edge of Cranborne Chase. The town looks over the Blackmore Vale, part of the River Stour container. From various viewpoints, it is possible to see at least as far as Glastonbury Tor to the northwest. Shaftesbury is the website of the former Shaftesbury Abbey, which was founded in 888 by King Alfred and turned into one of the richest religious facilities in the country, prior to being damaged in the Dissolution in 1539. Beside the abbey site is Gold Hill, a steep cobbled street used in the 1970s as the setup for Ridley Scott's television promotion for Hovis bread. In the 2011 census the community's civil parish had a population of 7,314.