‘Bottleneck’ Doncaster Station must be addressed before village can get new station, Mayor says

Capacity constraints at ‘bottleneck’ Doncaster Railway Station must be addressed before a local village can have a stop of its own, Mayor Ros Jones has said.

Multiple obstacles stand in the way of a new station in Askern the Mayor said when quizzed by local Reform UK councillor, Frank Jackson.

Coun Jackson said a new Askern Station would ‘deliver substantial economic and social benefits to both the local and wider communities’ and asked the Mayor if she still supported the campaign.

Mayor Jones said: “I am very aware of the campaign, run by Graham Moss and others. I fully backed the campaign and I still do.

“I have ensured we have the land to build a station, this council acquired the land to the rear of the library on the western side of the line a few years ago as a strategic acquisition, so that the land is available and ready for if and when we are able to get a train station for Askern.”

However, a business case for a new Askern Station ‘highlighted a number of challenges that would require significant funding’, the Mayor said.

She explained: “Doncaster station is a bottleneck and in need of considerable investment including additional platforms.

“Even once the capacity constraints were resolved on the East Coast Mainline, the next big obstacle would be to work with operators to encourage them to stop at a reopened Askern Station especially considering that Adwick station is less than a 10-minute drive away.”

Coun Jackson, a keen supporter of a new Askern Station, pointed out that any families without cars cannot get to Adwick Station, with online navigation tools estimating a walk of nearly 90 minutes.

He said Askern already sits on Grand Central’s London to Bradford line and that negotiations with the operator have determined that ‘if the station did reopen, they would be prepared to actually stop’.

The Mayor of Doncaster thanked the Reform UK councillor for the information, before suggesting that Askern residents without a car should just pay for the new On-Demand service launched by the SYMCA and is being piloted in the area.

On-Demand is a flexible minibus service operating in underserved areas of Rotherham and Doncaster and was announced alongside the South Yorkshire People’s Network earlier in 2026.

The People’s Network plan did include upgrades for Doncaster Station, but not until the 2030s.