BAE Systems Submarines will open a 750-space temporary car park for staff on Monday, 21 October.
It will be the first move in a car parking strategy that aims to meet the Company’s on and off-site parking requirements for the next 20 years.
The 750-space car is on a site known as the Waterfront, next to the Resolution logistics building on Barrow Island. The five-acre site is owned by Cumbria County Council, and planning permission was agreed by Barrow Borough Council. A shuttle bus will be available to and from the new car park.
Waterfront will be used as an alternative car park while development and expansion works are undertaken at two existing off-site car parks, one on Buccleuch Dock Road, the other at Cornmill Crossing. The first of these to be transformed will be the Buccleuch Dock Road site, which will close on Monday for approximately 10 months while a two-storey car park is built. It will provide 850 spaces when it reopens in approximately September 2020 – a net gain of 380 spaces over the current status.
The Company’s Head of Site Services, Paul Campbell, said: “This has been a long time coming; a huge amount of hard work. In collaboration with Barrow Borough Council and Cumbria County Council we’ve arrived at a solution that gives us sufficient parking capacity to meet the changing demands of the business.”
Taken together, the two improved car parks will boost the shipyard’s car parking capacity by more than 600 spaces by 2021, meeting the anticipated car parking demand for the next 20 years.
Steve Solsby, Assistant Director at Barrow Borough Council, explained why the Barrow Waterfront Business Park, was being temporarily used to unlock a solution to Barrow Island’s parking problem.
He said: “The expanding workforce at BAE Systems is to be welcomed, but we have seen parking challenges as a result.
“We felt it was important to work together with the company and with the landowners, Cumbria County Council, to ensure BAE Systems’ investment programme benefits the surrounding communities in the long term.”
