£255k approved for ‘assurance work’ on Oliver Coppard's Doncaster Sheffield Airport funding decision
Over £250,000 has been approved by the South Yorkshire Mayoral Combined Authority (SYMCA) to help with the upcoming decision on whether to release funding for Doncaster Sheffield Airport.
The £255k grant will come from the South Yorkshire Airport City project’s feasibility fund.
Documents relating to the decision to approve this grant said the project feasibility fund (PFF) helps “relieve capacity constraints and improve capability”; “reduce reliance on external expertise”; and “develop plans into a pipeline of programmes and projects and ensure project lifecycle funding is available, particularly for revenue-based schemes”.
Mayor of South Yorkshire Oliver Coppard has said he hopes to make a decision on whether to release gainshare funding for the reopening of Doncaster Sheffield Airport in “early September”.
The Local Democracy Reporting Service understands this latest grant will be used for “assurance work ahead of the decision” and additional development work around masterplanning for the Gateway East Site.
Reopening Doncaster Sheffield Airport was the key promise of Doncaster Mayor Ros Jones during her campaign to be re-elected earlier this year.
Mayor Jones won the May 2025 election by her slimmest margin ever – beating Reform UK’s Alexander Jones by less than one per cent.
Before polling day on May 1, the Prime Minister Sir Keir Starmer visited the airport site with his deputy, Angela Rayner, to announce a £30million funding boost for the project.
However, the reopening still relies on the gainshare funding from SYMCA.
Mayor Coppard has repeatedly expressed his desire to make the right decision on the airport.
He said in June: “I realise that people are frustrated… but we have to get it right.
“If we don’t prepare properly it will fail. We have to make sure we get it right the first time.”