My View, Peter Davies: Airport will be a pull from Farrrs and wide

Most Doncaster residents will welcome the opening of the FARRRS link road from the M18 to Parrots Corner '“ replacing the tortuous route designed by the town's traffic experts a decade ago.
The council is set to invest 9.1million in phase two of the FARRRS project, which will unlock 395,000m2 of commercial development space at Doncaster Sheffield airport as part of its Capital Programme.The council is set to invest 9.1million in phase two of the FARRRS project, which will unlock 395,000m2 of commercial development space at Doncaster Sheffield airport as part of its Capital Programme.
The council is set to invest 9.1million in phase two of the FARRRS project, which will unlock 395,000m2 of commercial development space at Doncaster Sheffield airport as part of its Capital Programme.

The route to the airport from all directions is now clear for the first time and must have a major impact on the success of Doncaster Airport in a relatively short space of time.

Whether the grandiose predictions of jobs and long term economic prosperity will materialise is another matter but the whole southern Doncaster transformation is a real step forward.

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With the proposed PGA golf course on the western side of the Great North Road hopefully still on the agenda and the Wildlife Park on the eastern side, there is real optimism that south Doncaster is finally on the way up and that a successful economy is about to be activated.

All three council administrations have supported the FARRRS project and its various offshoots since Martin Winter initiated it after the airport opened and everyone involved can take some credit for this positive conclusion.

The only criticism is the ludicrous description of the link road and the airport as the gateway to the Sheffield City Region.

The number of travellers rushing to spend time in Sheffield, Rotherham or Barnsley is surely negligible and to use this unattractive and somewhat limiting slogan is short-sighted and unimaginative.

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Those people flying into Doncaster will more likely be attracted to Nottinghamshire, Derbyshire, Lincolnshire, East Yorkshire and particularly York and the Dales.

The airport can be the Gateway to Yorkshire or, better still, with its geographical position and its proximity to the East Coast main line, the Gateway to England.

As for the new flights via Doncaster, the routes are mainly to Eastern Europe and some suspicious observers may conclude that the airlines are providing services more for economic migrants than for holidaymakers or business people.

There are too many social problems in this town for more cheap flights to be encouraged from those countries already supplying large numbers of EU migrants.

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Why is Doncaster Airport lumbered with Sheffield in its subtitle?

The airport is 25 miles from Sheffield and that city adds nothing to Doncaster’s economy. It has over many years been a major drain on our resources.

The airport should be renamed Doncaster International Airport (Robin Hood belongs to Nottingham) and we should have the confidence to get rid of the current unwanted and misleading 
association.