Dornafield Touring Park

The Canterbury Aire shows exactly how a large space close to a wonderful city can be put to use for MH who wish to visit. 

a few white lines, a sensible parking fee and, bingo, you have a success on your hands👍

Agreed, and they have had the foresight to provide dump and fill as well.👍 One we might use in the future

serious lack of understanding of MH usage in this thread, I'm afraid.

Not only in this thread but around the country. CAMpRA is doing a great job of educating organsiations and councils and trials are proving sucessful. Too sucessful in at least one case that I am aware of.

JVB it is not about cheap or free, it is about not paying for facilities you do not need.  Actually. it is big mistake not to make a charge for an Aire. The result is they attract to many users, some of which are the least desirable and it results in complaints of one reason or another. In the extreme the facility can end up being closed.

peedee

We spent a week at Dornafield in September 2021.  Our pitch was in the upper level of Blackrock Copse and was of a good size and well maintained.  Pitches up there are down cul de sacs so difficult to turn round if not going onto a specific pitch (an advantage of allocated pitch).  The lower area, which we walked around, was very busy.  Too much for our taste.  The facilities blocks were modern and well maintained.  The site had a storage area and the wardens pulled out and sited the caravans as far as I recall.  We have a 2 berth caravan and had no problem accessing and exiting the site (no worse than some of the other sites we’ve been on, and similar to where we store our caravan).  There were larger outfits on site too.  My mobile phone reception was non existent (O2).  Not sure about the others.  It’s only a short drive to Totnes.  We enjoyed our stay there.

" Pitches up there are down cul de sacs so difficult to turn round if not going onto a specific pitch (an advantage of allocated pitch)."

A long term over wintering site we use (abroad) has a herringbone design with multiple cul de sacs off two main roads...folk leave there van at reception and walk to check out their pitch.

this ensures no one gets caught having to reverse and cause problems.

with all day arrivals and no bow wave, there's never a space issue close to reception as there are only ever three or so vans tops, even in peak.

seems a simple system, or use pitch allocation, to make use of this layout.

I guess the club will install its own one way system as part of any refurbishment?

The user and all related content has been Deleted User

Morning

Dornafield will be run pretty much as it is now yt. No reversing out of cul de sacs, no one way systems. 

JK

Do they have pitch allocations as mentioned above? Many AS sites and commercials do.

if they don't (and having allocated pitches would be a huge departure from the CAMC norm) how would one avoid reversing from a cul de sac if the pitch you were aiming for didn't turn out to be 'the one'?

if the site is currently laid out with dead ends then one either has to choose prior to heading to a pitch or to be resigned to the fact that there will be some possible 'manoeuvring' to cope with.

choosing a pitch whilst sat in a car cruising round the usual site ring road is one thing, trying to do it whilst checking out cul de sacs is another.

If it's pitch allocation then that will be an interesting approach for visiting members.

Well there are already quite a few club sites with dead ends and have been for years, decades even, so it's not a new problem for the club at.

I can think of four sites straight away, and no such problems as you describe occur in my experience, at least when I'm there, and these are all busy sites.

On these sites the wardens always show on the site plan where problems could occur, and people are always given or offered a site plan and I've noticed if people do want a pitch in a dead end they walk from its entrance to have a look before choosing. Also when there are dead ends the roads are usually wider. And of course it appears if most caravans have movers? And if not simply unhitch and turn around by hand then hitch up again, or they have good reversing skills, but again never seen any problems, I think people are always forewarned as said to start with on these sites and use common sense.

It's not really a problem YT.

 

I agree CS. We have stayed on several sites with dead ends. It had never been a problem. We have always been shown on the site plan and advised to park at the end and check availability if interested. Not so much of an issue now though, although I prefer not to reverse on busy sites with kids about.