[5] Burscough developed later as a small farming village on a low ridge above the West Lancashire Coastal Plain, and has Viking roots – Burh-skogr = fortress in the woods.

The priory formerly housed the tombs of some of the Stanley family, earls of Derby, which are now to be found in Ormskirk parish church.

[6] With the building of the Leeds and Liverpool Canal and the coming of the railways in the mid-18th century new developments took place north of the original village, in what came to be called Burscough Bridge, though the two communities have long since melded together.

For over a hundred years (from c. 1892) there was an Ordnance Depot on the eastern edge of Burscough, but this closed in 1996 and the site has been redeveloped into housing.

[7] Burscough is within the West Lancashire constituency of the Parliament of the United Kingdom, and is currently represented by Ashley Dalton of the Labour Party.

The town is part the Burscough & Rufford electoral division of Lancashire County Council, currently represented by Eddie Pope of the Conservative Party.

Situated on the Leeds and Liverpool Canal, next to the southern bridge of the town centre, the development consists of approximately thirty units available for retail, leisure or office/studio space.

Current businesses operating within the central square of Burscough Wharf consist of an instrumental music school, various independent gift shops, food and drink outlets, including a burger restaurant, gin bar and tea room, and health and beauty salons,[14] and a fortnightly artisan market has been established.

The A59 trunk road and Leeds and Liverpool Canal pass through Burscough and the A5209 brings large volumes of traffic through the town from where it connects to the A59.

The company was formed by Outram's bakery of Southport, who could not find electric vehicles at a price they were prepared to pay, and so decided to build their own.

[22] Although they set up another company, Ross Auto Engineering, to manufacture battery electric vehicles in 1949, production of their own models continued at Burscough Bridge.

[26] There is a fishery in the town at Warper's Moss Lane, which has four-man-made lakes stocked with a wide variety of coarse fish including carp to around 20 pounds (9.1 kg).