News: Parkgate sidelined in station site search

A location has been agreed for a potential £14m new mainline station in Rotherham and it is not going to be at Parkgate, the initial front runner.

Transport bosses have agreed a preferred station location and the latest progress report confirms that it would not be built on the land immediately adjacent to Parkgate Shopping, the 575,000 sq ft retail destination that is one of the largest retail parks in the UK.

The South Yorkshire Passenger Transport Executive (SYPTE) in partnership with Rotherham Council commissioned a study in 2015 looking to identify the level of rail service required to support Rotherham's economic and transport needs.

As part of the study, benchmarking showed that Rotherham's economy is not as strong as comparable centres and its rail connectivity is not as good.

Despite the town's central station benefiting from a £8.5m redevelopment, the study concluded that the only practical and cost effective way to enhance rail connectivity to Rotherham is to consider providing a new railway station on the mainline to take advantage of services that currently pass through the borough but do not stop.

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A mainline station at Parkgate would cater for inter-regional services, in the form of a Parkway type station and would be complementary to the role of Rotherham Central. The study, carried out by JMP, indicated that the new station could benefit from direct services to Sheffield, Doncaster, Manchester and its airport, Cleethorpes, Hull, York, Newcastle, Reading and a potential new service to connect to Leeds.

Parkgate is also the location of a new final stop for the delayed £60m Sheffield-Rotherham tram train pilot project. Work was being carried out to see if the mainline station and tram-train stop, at opposite ends of the site, could be linked together with a park & ride facility.

Work has also been progressing on highway improvements, including a new multimilion pound link road between Aldwarke Lane and Parkgate Shopping, that could open up the adjacent redevelopment site, which is owned by Stadium Developments.

A report to the Sheffield City Region Combined Authority Transport Committee, states: "The outcome of the stage 1 work on the Rotherham Parkway Station is now complete and it has identified that the site immediately adjacent to Parkgate Shopping is not the preferred site and therefore the alignment of the access road is not affected.

"For the preferred station location, [consultants] ARUP has progressed the business case development work during Q3 based on the data held within the national Rail Demand Forecasting Model – MOIRA (assesses the impact of timetable changes on the rail network). The outcome of this is to be presented in the New Year.

"The outline design for the preferred station location is also being developed to ensure the cost estimates are robust as part of the business case appraisal process."

Other initial locations for new station include a Network Rail site at the former council depot at Greasbrough Road, Henry Boot's Parkgate development at Forge Way and even the mainline station at Masbrough that closed in 1987.

Discussion are ongoing withing the Sheffield City Region to consider funding options for the station and access road at Parkgate.

Last month it was revealed that sites in Rotherham are also being considered for a potential parkway station on the realigned HS2 route between London and Leeds.

Images: GVA