It’s our Birthday!
Cornwall Services, the county’s only motorway-style service station, celebrates its first birthday this month. It has marked the occasion by confirming Phase 2 of the service station development, with construction planned to commence in early 2016. This will include a 70-bed hotel with restaurant, Tourist Information Centre, dedicated dog walking area and an outdoor picnic and play area.
The service station, which is the only one of its type on the A30 west of Exeter, has had a busy year. The top weekend in terms of footfall was Easter weekend 2015, with an estimated 26,000 visitors through the doors. There have been a number of major developments over the last 12 months, notably the exciting launch of the Clip n Climb and soft play facilities in May, and the recent opening of a retail outlet by Devon clothing brand, Saltrock. It is now bracing itself for the start of the Summer holidays.
Cornwall Services’ first year in numbers:
- Over 10,000 pasties sold by Cornish Delish
- 6m is the height of the tallest climbing wall in Clip n Climb
- 2,000 balls in the Soft Play ball pool
- 900 times cars charged by the Ecotricity electric charging station -powering 25,000 zero emission miles
- 4,000 children have tried out the soft play since it opened in May
- 864,000 metres of toilet roll used in first year
- 5 is the height of the wind turbine behind the services
Cornwall Services has always strived to do things differently from what other service station chains are doing across the country. Mark Upton, the developer behind the services, explains:
“We are part of a new wave of service stations, including the likes of Gloucester Services, that are offering something a little bit different. Being independently owned we can easily adapt and develop the services in response to what our visitors want.
“We have always said that the facilities are for both tourists and local people alike, and recent developments reinforce this. A soft play centre and Clip n Climb walls are not what you would expect at a service station, but they were installed in response to a need for more things for local families to do, as well as offering a chance for children to let off steam on a long journey. We have also noticed a lot of people using Cornwall Services for business meetings, due to its convenient location. Again we are looking to respond to this and create some sort of Business Club that benefits this audience.”
Going forward Cornwall Services is set to become even more of a destination with Phase 2 of the development kicking off in February 2016.
Posted: July 21, 2015 at 8:52 am
