The team from Center Parcs have announced today November 5th 2024 that, after many months of searching, they have identified a site for a potential Center Parcs village in the Scottish Borders near Hawick, about 40 Miles from Moffat in Dumfries and Galloway.
A spokesperson stated “The site is in the Scottish Borders, north of Hawick and south of Selkirk, and around 90 minutes from Edinburgh and Newcastle, and two hours from Glasgow. Whilst we expect the village to look and feel like our existing villages, we are planning to take a bold, new approach and create our own woodland by planting thousands of new trees on the site, which is currently mostly open grassland. We have already carried out a number of site surveys and we believe that this is the right location for a Center Parcs in Scotland. Although this is a big day for us, it is only the start of a long journey towards submitting a planning application to the local authority. We will now continue with rigorous site surveys and pre-planning works, as well as drawing up detailed designs.
We are hoping to submit a planning application for 700 lodges, plus a range of leisure facilities -including a Subtropical Swimming Paradise and Aqua Sana Forest Spa – in 2025.”
A website has been created to share information, updates and plans relating to the project: www.centerparcsscotland.co.uk.
Tourism and hospitality businesses from Dumfries and Galloway are giving mixed feelings about the announcement, with some concerns about the facility taking possible visitors away from the region. Plus one local business owner said that they were concerned that visitors to Centre Parcs spend most of their time during their visits/holidays enjoying the Centre Parcs facilities and not visiting the surrounding areas and businesses.
Also Colin McKinley, the CEO of Centre Parcs has stated that the village will create 1200 new jobs, when hospitality businesses across Dumfries and Galloway and the Scottish Borders are already struggling to find staff to fill their vacancies.
