PF said:
Meanwhile ... just up country planning permission has been granted to build a Doncaster/Sheffield Airport rail station, why don't the "Sheffielders" petition for a PDQ train service from/to Finningley and the centre of Sheffield and then work on enticing the likes of KLM with their 80 seaters back to a Sheffield Airport (if in name only) that has a runway rather than half a runway and at least try to make one airport work rather than two that fail?
Or, might I ask, aren't trains as exciting as aeroplanes?
Permission may well have been granted to build a station at Finningley on the Doncaster-Lincoln line, but I don't think this will happen in the foreseeable future.
Several things militate against this proposal:
- the poor existing service on the line
- the low numbers of flights and passengers using the airport, especially in winter
- the inconvenient flight arrival and departure times, concentrated in the early morning/evening
- it had been proposed to divert the Lincoln-Sheffield- Doncaster-Adwick stopping trains to a P+R station at Finningley. Apart from depriving Adwick and Bentley of their service, it would have to traverse the very busy East Coast Main Line, causing pathing problems
- The distance between any potential station and the terminal is not negligible, and would require a shuttle bus; the bus from Doncaster Station/Interchange only takes about 35 minutes anyway except in heavy peak hours
- the nature of the clientele. DSA is not a tourist destination per se, so I would think the majority of passengers are dropped off by families, friends, or taxis/minibuses whether they are going on holiday or returning to Poland/Lithuania. The parking charge is reasonable if you book in advance.
The new road link to the M18, which has been approved, will facilitate this further, and provide faster times to Sheffield anyway. So I agree with you in some respects, just a different transport method.