Doncaster Sheffield Airport: 21 questions readers want answers on from Peel

More than 70,000 people have signed petitions, while local politicians, unions and your Free Press have all united in condemning the potential closure, which was announced last week.

Bosses at the property development firm, which is based in Manchester, have so far remain tight-lipped following last week’s Wednesday morning bombshell.

But upset Free Press readers are calling for answers to a series of questions about the airport’s future.

We asked you what you wanted to ask Peel – and we’ve put the questions to them via email.

We’re awaiting a response and may not even get one, but here’s the tough questions you wanted us to put to Peel

Is there any chance the airport will stay open? What will happen to the grants and loans used to build the airport and which have been used to keep it running? Did you purposely choose to let the airport fail so you could develop it? Why can't you attract airlines like Ryanair and Jet2 to Doncaster? Why don't you offer more routes and why don't airlines seem to want to stay? Has Peel not learned from its mistakes at Sheffield and Teesside? Why are flights from Doncaster so expensive? Given that you boasted a strong profit in 2020 it appears that the issues you've faced have largely been due to the COVID pandemic. Is there any reason to believe profits can't become just as healthy as those in 2020 going forward? Why did you refuse to show your accounts yet still wanted a £20m loan from the government? Will you be giving Doncaster Council the millions for the infrastructure it provided for your new business park and housing estate back? Will you consider selling it to another operator or local authority? Why did you reopen after the pandemic if you planned to close so soon with so little notice? What needs to be done to keep the airport open? If you are not interested in doing whatever is required, will you sell to an investor who does care? What will you do if the local authority advise they will not give permission for change of use for the land? A decision of this scale doesn't happen overnight- so when was this actually put on the table as a choice? And given the negative impact you knew it was going to have,what steps did you take to try and avoid it before going down the closure route? If you dont want to keep it open as a passenger airport, have you considered a cargo only airport? What's it like making over 800 people unemployed in hard times that we are in? Why has there just been a new airbridge with extra gates just been built? Drop the landing charges let other airlines in and you will for sure have a viable airport. If your not intrested in this step aside and let someone else do it. Peel Group, is it true you have a deal with TUI for exclusivity use of the airport and no under any circumstances to aloud Jet2 to use it ? Why are flights so expensive from DSA?