Archived News 2008

With an investment of £250m, 3,000 jobs created and more than three million visitors a year, the former colliery at Glass Houghton near Castleford has been a major success story for the district.

Hundreds of jobs were lost in the 1970s and 1980s when the pits closed and the local community was left devastated.

The site itself was contaminated after hundreds of years of industry left its chemical footprint behind.

But now an economic and environment revolution has taken place.

The site has been totally redeveloped with Xscape, the indoor ski centre, hundreds of shops at Freeport and new offices.

And the once-poisoned land is now a thriving nature habitat for birds, wildlife and flowers.

Reporter VICTORIA TURTON spent the day with developers Waystone to look back at the mammoth transformation of the site as it approaches the 15th anniversary since the visionary plans for the site were first created.

CENTURIES of mining devastated by the local eco-system at Glass Houghton.

And a mammoth task was undertaken to attract the wildlife, which had fled the cyanide, phenols and tar from the coke works which permeated the land around the pit, back to the site.

When the developers first arrived almost 15 years ago, they faced the task of filling and capping old mine shafts, dismantling underground structures and the overwhelming difficulty of neutralising contaminated land.

The land needed to be restored to its natural state and be safe before the redevelopment could begin. Gwyn James, contracts manager, said: “I think the biggest thing that we’ve done on site is get rid of the contaminated material.

“This stopped the land and surface water becoming polluted and the water that discharges from the site is also clean.”

But instead of transporting the hazardous waste on public roads, it was decided the best solution to protect the environment was to build a waste facility on site.

It was passed by the Environment Agency, and the contaminated earth was placed in a specially built cell, then buried on the site.

Mr James said: “A special unit, which was lined with impermeable material to prevent leaking, was built to hold the contaminated material safely.”

Abandoned mine shafts were full of dirty water which created a health risk and were impossible to build on.

Mr James said: “We kept finding new engineering solutions so we could build on the land.

“We devised a way of squeezing out the water and we managed to reclaim 30 acres of land we could develop on.”

After the major problems were tackled, the company turned its attention to restoring the fragile eco-system of the site.

Development Director, Helen McLoughlin said: “When we first started there was a shortage of heather planting so we decided to get some growing.

“We spent about five years trying to get it to grow and eventually it did and now, not only does it look good, it also attracts important wildlife back to the site.”

Business Express (Wakefield Express) - Special Report - 12 September 2008