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Doncaster Sheffield Airport Rail Link Proposal

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ricoblade

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Hi All,

I've just seem this article: The Sheffield City Region, Doncaster Council and the Peel Group (owners of Doncaster Sheffield Airport) have taken a major step forward today by submitting an outline business case to the Government which could deliver a new national and regional rail connection to Doncaster Sheffield Airport (DSA).

It's a new spur off the ECML north of Bawtry, then joining the Lincoln to Doncaster line near Auckley, all proposed electrification.

https://www.adsadvance.co.uk/dsa-rail-connection-plan-submitted-to-government.html
The Sheffield City Region, Doncaster Council and the Peel Group (owners of Doncaster Sheffield Airport) have taken a major step forward today by submitting an outline business case to the Government which could deliver a new national and regional rail connection to Doncaster Sheffield Airport (DSA).

With just 4.5 miles of new track required, the proposed GatewayEast Growth Hub Rail scheme will add high speed electrified rail connectivity to the UK’s fastest growing airport, alleviate congestion on the East Coast Mainline (ECML), creating an airp
ort with great potential to expand by making use of largely existing infrastructure.
 
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MarkRedon

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Good timing? A major review of airports policy must now take place, following the realisation that British law requires the climate emergency to impact planning and that an LHR third runway adds to unsustainability.

Investing in DSA / Finningley might permit the closure or de-emphasis of the weather-prone LBA / Yeadon and destination-light HUY / Humberside airports. No money need be wasted on a dubious airport station in a ditch (Horsforth Parkway proposal). DSA has a splendid runway and could, with decent rail links, serve the population centres of Hull, Leeds, Bradford, York and Sheffield.

What's not to like?
 

HullRailMan

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Highly unlikely that Leeds Bradford would close. Imagine the joy of residents in the north of those cities having to race to an airport in the middle of nowhere beyond Doncaster.

If the UK wants to remain competitive, we need to invest in and expand airport capacity. The Eco-warriors that are trying to halt Heathrow expansion need to realise that stopping a third runway will achieve nothing in terms of global emissions. The economic growth of China, India and South America will infinitely dwarf any carbon savings by stalling Heathrow.
 

thejuggler

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Good timing? A major review of airports policy must now take place, following the realisation that British law requires the climate emergency to impact planning and that an LHR third runway adds to unsustainability.

Investing in DSA / Finningley might permit the closure or de-emphasis of the weather-prone LBA / Yeadon and destination-light HUY / Humberside airports. No money need be wasted on a dubious airport station in a ditch (Horsforth Parkway proposal). DSA has a splendid runway and could, with decent rail links, serve the population centres of Hull, Leeds, Bradford, York and Sheffield.

What's not to like?

What's not to like is Doncaster is in a population desert.

My parents live in South Yorkshire, they have never used DSA, no need to. EMA is less than an hour away, LBA and MAN about an hour.

Anyone living in Leeds and Bradford are a few miles from LBA, no need to even think about getting to a station, then getting a train to DSA.
 

LMS 4F

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If the rail link takes as long to complete as the link road from the M18 across to the A638 and then onto the airport, I would advise against holding your breath.
 

johnnychips

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Not again! Flybe has pulled out of DSA (Doncaster-Sheffield Airport) for well-publicised reasons, TUI has expanded a bit and I expect Wizz, with their many Eastern European destinations, are holding their breath to see what effect Brexit has.

A spur from the existing Donny-Lincoln line would cost a small fortune, let alone any deviation from the East Coast Main Line.

The relatively new X6 bus from Sheffield to DSA has never had more than five passengers on it every time I’ve seen or used it. If Stagecoach are not being subsided by someone, I can’t see it lasting.

Most passengers from DSA get there by car and leave it (parking is relatively cheap); being dropped off by friends and family; or shared taxi.

I would suggest people who think this is a good, economically effective idea, should Google the DSA arrivals and departures board.

I have used DSA many times: it is a great airport with fantastic staff. Unfortunately the excellent service correlates with the low number of people using it.
 
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158756

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According to the airport's own website there are 8 departures tomorrow, only one in the morning and a four hour gap between 4 and 8pm. On Thursday there are just two departures.
 

Dr Hoo

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Noting that the 'plan' is for a loop off the ECML, via a new airport station, re-joining the Gainsborough-Doncaster line I am unclear as to what services might use it. All the current ECML services are long distance fast trains that nobody would want to divert and serve few nearby towns and cities (other than Doncaster) anyway.
 

tbtc

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Not again! Flybe has pulled out of DSA (Doncaster-Sheffield Airport) for well-publicised reasons, TUI has expanded a bit and I expect Wizz, with their many Eastern European destinations, are holding their breath to see what effect Brexit has

Agreed!

I can see why this might make some sense to outsiders. It's an airport with plenty of capacity, you could have flights from DSA without building an additional runway, it's got a relatively long runway too AIUI.

Whilst it's some distance from Leeds, the difference in journey time between a direct train to DSA and the 757 bus to Leeds Bradford might not be so great (especially given Kirkstall Road traffic).

BUT... it'd be a nonsense.

If you were building our infrastructure from scratch then it's a reasonable enough location - not too far from a motorway, not too far from a railway, nice and flat and without the weather risks that affect Leeds Bradford.

However, it was opened too late to compete with the other airports (meaning it was in the same league as Humberside/ Teesside rather than potentially bigger than LeedsBradford/EastMIdlands if it had been opened sooner).

So it's sustained by cheap and cheerful Mediterranean holidays and migrant workers heading to/from Poland etc - two sectors of the economy seriously at risk from Brexit.

The airport is struggling.

Ah, but it's got Peel on its side. Peel are the maters at spin, amazing at squeezing public money into infrastructure projects that massively increase the value of Peel's neighbouring land. They drop this suggestion into the press every few months - e.g. millions of people in London could get to DSA just as fast as Heathrow/ Gatwick/Stansted if only the Government spent hundreds of millions of pounds building an ECML loop and diverting long distance expresses via the Airport (which, as @Dr Hoo points out , would be a nonsense - you're not going to divert Edinburgh services via the Airport!). Peel know how to get these stories into the press though, they have a knack for managing to give journalists enough of a juicy angle to print them ("Doncaster Airport could rival Heathrow according to new plans" etc). Dress it up as part of a regional strategic plan, chuck in a few bells and whistles, make it look "green" by electrifying the line (even though the ultimate plan is lots more flights!).

Either squeeze large sums of money from the public purse to prop up your struggling Airport or accept that the future looks bleak (but, if it gets bad, you'll go to your journalist pals and blackmail the council into buying it off you, with "dozens" of jobs at risk etc etc)
 

ainsworth74

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Ah, but it's got Peel on its side. Peel are the maters at spin, amazing at squeezing public money into infrastructure projects that massively increase the value of Peel's neighbouring land. They drop this suggestion into the press every few months - e.g. millions of people in London could get to DSA just as fast as Heathrow/ Gatwick/Stansted if only the Government spent hundreds of millions of pounds building an ECML loop and diverting long distance expresses via the Airport (which, as @Dr Hoo points out , would be a nonsense - you're not going to divert Edinburgh services via the Airport!). Peel know how to get these stories into the press though, they have a knack for managing to give journalists enough of a juicy angle to print them ("Doncaster Airport could rival Heathrow according to new plans" etc). Dress it up as part of a regional strategic plan, chuck in a few bells and whistles, make it look "green" by electrifying the line (even though the ultimate plan is lots more flights!).

Either squeeze large sums of money from the public purse to prop up your struggling Airport or accept that the future looks bleak (but, if it gets bad, you'll go to your journalist pals and blackmail the council into buying it off you, with "dozens" of jobs at risk etc etc)

I mean that scheme worked grand for Peel with Teesside Airport. Peel got £40m of tax payer money for selling their share in the airport after plenty of "the future is bleak" type stories. And I mean the future is still bleak of course but hey now I'm on the hook rather than the private sector so that's better somehow?
 

IanXC

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The only hope I can see for this scheme is to cut back the ambition a bit and look at infrastructure to extend some of the Doncaster terminating services to the airport. Leeds to Doncaster, Hull to Doncaster and Sheffield to Doncaster would seem suitable. Then add a way for the Doncaster to Lincoln services to call, and in a few years you've got 4 trains an hour in all directions, without needing to go anywhere near ECML fast services.
 

tbtc

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I mean that scheme worked grand for Peel with Teesside Airport. Peel got £40m of tax payer money for selling their share in the airport after plenty of "the future is bleak" type stories. And I mean the future is still bleak of course but hey now I'm on the hook rather than the private sector so that's better somehow?

This seems to be Peel's modus operandi - try and squeeze as much money out of the public sector as possible (get new roads built to increase the value of the land that Peel own, go cap in hand and demand that they allow you to build a thousand homes on adjacent land to make the Airport sustainable... and if that fails then you try to guilt trip politicians/councils into buying it off you, dump the liabilities on the public sector... got to love modern capitalism, eh?

What about the airport as a major freight hub....Rail link a big possibility ?

I guess there's the iPort for that ("inland port"), nearby Amazon distribution place etc
 

swanhill41

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Thinking of the farce at Heathrow....Must be a lot of air freight that could be diverted to what in effect could be a cargo only airport ?
 

goatie

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I attended a site visits in 2003/04 with surveyors looking at running a route from just before finningley station, that was still when it was Network rail, and the maintenance guy were outside companies

at that time I'm sure the RAF buildings were still there, their Idea was just a bay platform, when I asked about it being electrified (that's where I'm from) they said NO, folks will change at Donny or direct services with be diesals

its a great airport for me, as it does what I want easy & quick, it may be chicken & egg not enough flights/not enough passengers
 

Class 170101

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Thinking of the farce at Heathrow....Must be a lot of air freight that could be diverted to what in effect could be a cargo only airport ?

I thought a lot of freight went to East Midlands Airport already?

The only hope I can see for this scheme is to cut back the ambition a bit and look at infrastructure to extend some of the Doncaster terminating services to the airport. Leeds to Doncaster, Hull to Doncaster and Sheffield to Doncaster would seem suitable. Then add a way for the Doncaster to Lincoln services to call, and in a few years you've got 4 trains an hour in all directions, without needing to go anywhere near ECML fast services.

This option is more plausible but would need electrification or some sort of bi-mode train for the Leeds to Doncaster services to be extended to a new station at the Airport. Also a some signalling / track layout improvements to allow services to reverse here.

Lincoln to Doncaster I believe is due to recieve a better service (hourly?) from EMT as part of its franchise from December 2021 as I recall.

However as noted with the Heathrow decision I do wonder whether any airports will be allowed to expand?
 

AndyW33

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Thinking of the farce at Heathrow....Must be a lot of air freight that could be diverted to what in effect could be a cargo only airport ?
Heathrow certainly handles a lot of cargo, but it travels in the holds of passenger flights which would fly anyway, there are only six or so cargo-only flights a day. East Midlands, Manchester and Stansted are the places that handle dedicated cargo flights in the main. The dispersal of cargo away from Heathrow has already been done.
 

Edders23

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East Midlands airport is the big freight hub but most air freight is high value perishables or urgent parts or parcels so doubt there is much scope for the former robin hood airport there and as for a rail link WHY ? would there ever be enough traffic to justify it ?

We have too many airports competing for what traffic there is in that part of the world it's the south east that hasn't enough capacity and even less now that the Heathrow plan has been scuppered

But give it a few more years and we might well have alternatives to business travel becoming more widely used as companies seek to become greener by flying their employees around the globe less I can see two or three airports closing down and Doncaster is one that might well disappear as the air travel market shrinks
 

edwin_m

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If you were building our infrastructure from scratch then it's a reasonable enough location - not too far from a motorway, not too far from a railway, nice and flat and without the weather risks that affect Leeds Bradford.
I think if airports were being centrally planned in that sort of way (assuming the same roads and railways in this parallel universe as we actually have) then we would have ended up with RAF Church Fenton or Sherburn-in-Elmet being adopted as a "Yorkshire Airport". Either site is close to link to new stations on existing railways that would have provided reasonably frequent service to all the main centres, and being in a fairly flat area a motorway spur wouldn't be too difficult, possibly starting from where the A1 and M1 meet. This would have avoided the need for DSA, LBIA, Humberside and possibly Teesside too, and combining all their passengers in a single airport would be more likely to achieve "critical mass" to sustain a decent range of services.

This option is more plausible but would need electrification or some sort of bi-mode train for the Leeds to Doncaster services to be extended to a new station at the Airport. Also a some signalling / track layout improvements to allow services to reverse here.
These alterations would need to be quite drastic. Doncaster suffers from many flat junction conflicts and although there is theoretically a route to the Lincoln line flyover that stays to the west of the Fast lines it's quite convoluted and still conflicts with the Sheffield lines. I think as a minimum it would need a new island in the sidings west of the station, possibly ramping up and over the Sheffield lines, and new direct tracks through the various freight yards to get to the flyover.

HS2, assuming it isn't de-scoped on the east side, would mean the ECML in this area would no longer need to provide the fastest journeys between London and beyond Doncaster. So there might be some scope for diversion of some via an airport loop. However the airport and any development around it would have to generate huge numbers of passengers to make something like this worthwhile.
 

johnnychips

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...However the airport and any development around it would have to generate huge numbers of passengers to make something like this worthwhile.

Exactly. What is also notable about DSA’s small number of flights is that they depart early in the morning or in the mid to late evening, which is not favourable to public transport.
 

frodshamfella

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I wish Peel would come up with some plans for a fixed rail to Liverpool John Lennon Airport, would be beneficial for outbound and inbound tourists .
 

frodshamfella

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Exactly. What is also notable about DSA’s small number of flights is that they depart early in the morning or in the mid to late evening, which is not favourable to public transport.

I think Thomson are basing more aircraft there for summer with some doing long haul so there will be more flights.
 

nimbus21

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People are living in cloud cuckoo land if they think people from Leeds and Bradford will use the proposed link. LBA is centrally located just a few miles north of both cities so will always be the first choice.
 

tbtc

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I think if airports were being centrally planned in that sort of way (assuming the same roads and railways in this parallel universe as we actually have) then we would have ended up with RAF Church Fenton or Sherburn-in-Elmet being adopted as a "Yorkshire Airport". Either site is close to link to new stations on existing railways that would have provided reasonably frequent service to all the main centres, and being in a fairly flat area a motorway spur wouldn't be too difficult, possibly starting from where the A1 and M1 meet. This would have avoided the need for DSA, LBIA, Humberside and possibly Teesside too, and combining all their passengers in a single airport would be more likely to achieve "critical mass" to sustain a decent range of services

Agreed - that would have been a much better location - we could have had one decent sized Airport on each side of the Pennines (with good connections to rail/ motorways), instead of spreading supply thinly between several places - shame it hasn't worked out like that

People are living in cloud cuckoo land if they think people from Leeds and Bradford will use the proposed link. LBA is centrally located just a few miles north of both cities so will always be the first choice.

LBA is up in the hills, a long way from a train station or much dual carriageway - the time penalty for a train between Leeds city centre and DSA might not be much compared to the struggle up the A65 at the moment (it's pie in the sky stuff, I can't see DSA being given all the things on Peel's wish list, I'm not supporting DSA, but I don't think it's cloud cuckoo land to suggest that Leeds people wouldn't use a reasonably fast air link)
 

bluenoxid

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Whilst everyone is talking about LBA vs DSA from Leeds railway station, Manchester Airport is sat their clicking its fingers to “trains every 30 minutes” and “Motorway to the front door”

Got to stop watching Drag Race.
 

Glenn1969

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Surely there is more chance of passengers from Gainsborough, Lincoln, Retford and Worksop using a DSA station in numbers than those from Leeds and Bradford?
 

Class 170101

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Surely there is more chance of passengers from Gainsborough, Lincoln, Retford and Worksop using a DSA station in numbers than those from Leeds and Bradford?

If direct services are provided to it then I see no reason think passengers from Leeds won't use it.
 

Glenn1969

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Yes but they have their own airport and good connections to Manchester. If DSA was Leeds side of Doncaster there might be a better case for them using DSA but it's a long way south of Doncaster
 

Bantamzen

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This story does the rounds every few years. There's been a few versions of it, from a loop off the EMCL to serve the airport, a new station on the existing Doncaster-Gainsborough line, and now a hybrid of both with the line branching off of the Gainsborough line, through the site and back onto the ECML. The one thing it will share in common with the other two is that it will get batted back. I'm really not sure how running slower trains around this new loop and back onto the ECML will as Peel claim reduce congestion. If anything I'd think it would be the other way around.

And even if it did get built in some form, with just the Leeds-Doncaster services extended to it, Doncaster is a good 45 minutes away from Leeds (hourly service), so the airport would be at least 5-10 minutes further out. With the TPEs services to Manchester Airport (half hourly) taking about 20 minutes longer to serve a much bigger airport, and a possible LBA Parkway station in the offing with up to 4tph taking around 10 minutes, there really wouldn't be much traffic for DSA even if it had more flights. Most of West Yorkshire's population live much closer to LBA & within easy reach of Manchester, so I just can't see the case for a link that would really only serve South Yorkshire.
 
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