Transport in Doncaster
Doncaster's geographical location gives it some of the best transport facilities for a town of its size. Road links to the A1(M) motorway and the M18 motorway and M62 motorway allow fast and easy journey times to many areas of the UK and surrounding cities and towns including London as well as by rail. Doncaster Sheffield Airport opened in April 2005 and offers flights to destinations in Europe, and the United Kingdom.
Road
The town is located close to the M18 and A1(M) motorways, with access to both from the town centre. South of the town, the M18 and A1(M) cross at an interchange. The A638 runs through the town itself, from north to south. This follows the line of the old A1, before the Doncaster bypass in 1960. The A19 road to Newcastle and York also starts in Doncaster as well as the A635 with a direct link to Barnsley and various other A road links to major towns and cities including Sheffield, Wakefield and Scunthorpe.
Bus
Doncaster's bus services are co-ordinated by the South Yorkshire Passenger Transport Executive. The largest operator in the town (as well as South Yorkshire) is First South Yorkshire, who are closely followed by Stagecoach Yorkshire and Arriva Yorkshire Other companies who operate in and around the town include Wilfreda Beehive, Isle Coaches, Powell’s and Travel South Yorkshire who are in close partnership with First South Yorkshire. All bus companies make use of the Doncaster Frenchgate Interchange next to the station which is the first interchange in the UK to be based inside a shopping centre.
South Yorkshire Transport
South Yorkshire Transport (SYT) was formed in 1986, as a result of deregulation of bus services. The South Yorkshire PTE was no longer allowed to operate buses itself, so an arms length operating company was established. SYT operated buses in and around Doncaster, Barnsley, Rotherham and Sheffield.
The company was sold to its employees in 1993, and it became Mainline Group Limited. It was bought by FirstGroup in 1998, at first operating as First Mainline but now operating as First South Yorkshire.
SYT's head office was located on Amos Road in Meadowhal] and at the time of the company's formation its central works was located on Queens Road in Sheffield, although this later closed. They also have bases at all 4 major interchanges in South Yorkshire, the Frenchgate Interchange being one of those.
Buses in Doncaster were based at two garages in the borough.
The main depot was the former Doncaster Corporation garage on Leicester Avenue, close to Doncaster Racecourse. In the 1980s, a new workshop building was erected at the rear of the yard behind the garage. In the early 1990s, the main depot building was demolished and the land sold. This made way for a new Wickes DIY store. The new workshop, yard and small section of the old garage building, which contained a bus-wash facility, remained. The only access to the smaller depot was now on Leger Way also nearby to Doncaster's Racecourse.
The second garage, which was much smaller, was on Bootham Lane in Dunscroft. This has been sold off and cleared to make way for a housing estate.
They are currently based at the depot on Leger Way and at peak times, buses are used from the depot based in Rotherham at Midland Road.
Doncaster Mainline
Doncaster Mainline buses were represented in a silver grey and red livery relieved by a light yellow band and in 2014 has had one newer bus refurbished by FirstGroup to this fleet colour but isn't exact to the former fleet colours. The company was generally popular with passengers, and boasted an extensive network with low fares and modern vehicles. Mainline was sold to its employees in 1993, though Stagecoach bought a 20% stake in the company not long after. This had to be sold off in 1995, at which point the newly created FirstBus took the 20%.
First South Yorkshire
Mainline was taken over by FirstGroup in 1998, and became First Mainline. The livery became just red and yellow, a reminiscence of the original 1989 Sheffield mainline livery. The name was altered again to First South Yorkshire. Since about 2000, vehicles began being repainted in FirstGroup corporate livery (nicknamed "Barbie"). There are three versions of the "Barbie": Barbie 1 was the main corporate livery used across South Yorkshire, Barbie 2 was a livery intended for buses pre 1998 but this livery has almost been phased out and Barbie 3 is a revised version of Barbie 1. There have recently been new single decker buses released into service and are the first time Doncaster has seen such a large investment in buses since 2002. There was also a trial on the X78 service to Sheffield in which new double deckers were run for a month but have since been withdrawn and are only used in Sheffield and on the X1 Steel Link.
Stagecoach Yorkshire
Stagecoach Yorkshire Services in Doncaster:
Note: Some services may be operated by Stagecoach in Lincolnshire
| No. | Branding | Route | Mon-Fri Frequency | Saturday Frequency | Sunday Frequency |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| 220 | Dearne Link | Doncaster - Conisbrough - Mexborough - Wath Upon Dearne - Rotherham Interchange | 30 Mins | 30 Mins | 60 Mins |
| 221 | Dearne Link | Doncaster - Conisbrough - Mexborough - Swinton - Rotherham Interchange | 30 mins | 60 Mins | 60 Mins |
| 222 | Dearne Link | Mexborough - Wath Upon Dearne - Wombwell - Barnsley Interchange | 30 mins | 60 mins | 60 mins |
| 219 | Dearne Link | Doncaster - Sprotbrough - Cadeby - Goldthorpe - Thurnscoe - Darfield - Barnsley Interchange | 30 mins | 60 mins | 60 mins |
| X19 | Dearne Link | Doncaster - Scawsby - Goldthorpe - Darfield - Barnsley Interchange | 30 mins | 30 mins | 60 mins |
| 99 | None | Retford - Ranskill - Doncaster Racecourse - Doncaster | 60 mins | 60 mins | N/A
98 Doncaster - Bawtry - Gringley - Misterton - Gainsborough 120 mins 120 mins |
| 29 | None | Doncaster - Bawtry - Harworth - Blyth - Retford | 60 mins (Approx) | 120 mins | N/A |
| 21/25 | None | Doncaster - Bawtry - Harworth - Blyth (25) - Carlton in Lindrick (21) - Worksop | 30 mins | 30 mins | 60 mins |
| 22 | None | Doncaster - Wadworth - Tickhill - Oldcotes - Langold - Carlton in Lindrick - Worksop | 30 mins | 30 mins | 60 mins |
Other companies include Stagecoach in Bassetlaw, Stagecoach in Lincolnshire, Isle Coaches, Arriva Yorkshire, Wilfreda Beehive, Tate Travel and South Yorkshire Motors.
A recent partnership known as the Doncaster Bus Partnership has recently been formed to encourage more use of public transport in Doncaster and to manage all bus services and is thought to be one of the key reasons for the release of new buses in Doncaster in recent months. It has also introduced new tickets going by the advertisement of ‘Don Tickets’ and can be used within any company in Doncaster for a slight increase in price. This has never been seen in the town before so has come as a benefit to many using the weekly or monthly passes.
Rail
Doncaster railway station is situated on the East Coast Main Line. Lines to Hull, Leeds, York, Lincoln and Sheffield branch off.
The station is served by the largest number of train operators in the United Kingdom with CrossCountry, East Midlands Railway, Grand Central, Hull Trains, London North Eastern Railway, Northern and TransPennine Express all operating services.
The Doncaster International Railport opened in 1995. Doncaster PSB is one of the largest signalling centres on the network, controlling hundreds of miles of railway. The Doncaster Works was one of the largest in the country. Amongst its output were the Flying Scotsman and Mallard. Today it is operated by Wabtec and overhauls rolling stock.
GB Railfreight's main depot is located in Donaster while Doncaster Carr rail depot has been redeveloped to service the Class 800 / 801 Azumas for London North Eastern Railway.
Virgin Trains have recently introduced new timetables increasing times through the week but with the largest increase on Saturdays. This has been seen as the biggest upgrade in services since 1990 when the electrification ofnthe East Coast Mainline was completed.
Northern Rail and TransPennine Express are both expected to release new timetables in the coming months increasing services to East Yorkshire and North Lincolnshire. Northern will also scrap the pacer trains by 2019 meaning many new and refurbished trains will be introduced in and around Doncaster and South Yorkshire.
Air
Doncaster Sheffield Airport opened on 28 April 2005 as Robin Hood Doncaster Sheffield Airport. The airport was created following the redevelopment of the former Royal Air Force station RAF Finningley, that had closed in 1994. The airport previously served many destinations through partners like Monarch Airlines and Ryanair but both companies withdrew their flights from the airport due to their not being enough passengers as prices were too high according to many in the area so now only serves few specific areas of the world through principal carrier Thomson Airways and Flybe as well as other carrier including Wizz Air And Thomas Cook only serving in the summer seasons. During its first year of operation, at the airports peak in 2007 in handled 1,078,374 passengers.In 2010 it handled 876,153 passengers. In 2014, Links Air also began flights to Belfast and the Isle of Man.
In the last year, Flybe have based themselves at DSA and have proven very popular offering cheap flights to many cities across Europe, some of which have never been available before and are continuing to introduce new flights and destinations as the company and airport grows.
The airport has just been awarded the best small airport in the UK in all categories and is labelled as the fastest growing airport in the country.
The town also lies within reasonable driving distances and has good rail access to Manchester Airport, Leeds Bradford Airport, East Midlands Airport and Humberside Airport.
Sea
Ferries to Europe from Hull
With the good rail links from the Network Rail cargo depot situated near the south of Doncaster and on the East Coast Main Line as well as many options of road links from the town, travel time to the Port of Hull can be achieved in under an hour. From Hull, P&O Ferries run services to Rotterdam in the Netherlands and Zeebrugge in Belgium.