Landlord Voice Magazine July 2015 - Doncaster | Page 10

DONCASTER

Back to the future – Doncaster’s logistics revival

M

any great towns in the UK
have seen their ups and
downs over the course of
the last century and Doncaster is no
exception.
But what set it apart from other
big mining towns when the industry
collapsed in the 1980s was its location
- roughly half way between London
and Edinburgh on the Great Northern
Railway Line.
Since the coal industry’s decline,
Doncaster’s proximity to other
major cities and motorway and rail
infrastructure has given it a vital
lifeline in the form of distribution and
logistics - the town became home to
a rail terminal for Channel Tunnel
freight in 1995 and was handling

12,500 containers per year by the late
1990s.
Since then it has seen the likes of
Next, Tesco and Amazon building
distribution centres in and around its
borders.
The town’s reputation for rail
engineering and its location on the
East Coast Mainline – combined with
massive support from business and
public sector partners such as local
authorities, colleges and chambers of
commerce up and down the country
– has helped it secure the winning bid
to host the National High Speed Rail
College.
The college, which will be built on
a five-acre site on Carolina Way, will
train thousands of young engineers

who will deliver billions of pounds of
rail contracts over the coming decades,
including the new high-speed rail link
between London and the north (HS2).
Doncaster’s rail and engineering
industry now employs more than
10,000 people and there is strong
interest from companies looking to
locate here.
Ros Jones, Mayor of Doncaster,
said: “The College will enable our rail
and engineering companies to build
on their success, up-skill our existing
workforce and help attract new
companies to the area who will benefit
from being located amongst their
supply chain.
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10 | LandlordVoice | July 2015

July 2015 | LandlordVoice | 11