Trivia:
Penultimate new site opened by Granada before the demerger & rebranding to become Moto.

When built it was very experimental. Appears to be based on Airport facilities, providing convienience shopping. (UK law prevents MSA's being anything more than a stop off point- it must not be a place to drive to)

The original application names this site as "Long Whatton"

The Travelodge is built around the MSA. Neil Turner sent us some picutres and you can see below the Travelodge hotel is built around the main courtyard area with windows overlooking it. Handy if you are an insomniac- you can watch people in the MSA at 3am. Sleep will surely come quickly....

Has a Little Chef, Burger King, FreshExpress, Halfords and a branch of Thorntons chocolates

Currently has a 5 Star Loo of the year Award 2003 along with 33 others in the road transport category. (find best loos overall)

Current:
Very pleasant to visit- as one of the newer sites it is airy and does resemble a shopping court.

Photos:
Thanks to Neil Turner for sending these photos
Andrew M C Brodie

Donington services hotel windows — In the picture below you can see the hotel windows on the wall on the right of the picture.

Thanks:
James (aka Robin Cook)
Neil Turner - photos and pointing out the Travelodge curiosity
Tony Lloyd

Received votes so far and a sample of comments:

People who prefer this MSA

People happy to visit

People who avoid this MSA

Selection of comments received

the lake out the back always makes me laugh, more of a pond really. Nice view form there though and little noise from tMway " 2006-02-02
bring back the separate truckers cafe...give the truckers somewhere quiet to eat and chill after putting up with the idiots on the motorways and somewhere there are no kids running all over the place when they are trying to eat. " 2006-02-02
It had the friendliest staff at the Little Chef when we regularly visited our son at university between 2001 and 2004. " 2006-03-12
I used to work here, when a student, in the late 1970s, at the time of the Grunwick Picket! We all can recall the regular arrival during the early hours of the morning of up to twenty to thirty coach loads of Yorkshire Miners. It was like bedlam! " 2006-05-24
Good idea as a truck stop, nice and clean. Often cant get a seat in the restaurant though when full of coaches - sort of defeats the object - especially as Knutsford theoretically is a no-go truck area " 2006-06-18
One of the service areas with well designed caravan bays and good facilities at the same time. " 2006-06-24
the best service station in the UK and i like the water feature too, nice! " 2007-04-09
i do like Donington Park services although its a bit noisy with the planes overhead " 2007-04-09
Incredible views when there is snow " 2007-09-19

This is a very old site, and we used to have a voting/comment system here, but for now it is turned off, sorry. Please also note the comments above are very old too and won't necessarily reflect the current state of the site and reflect the opinion of a visitor to the website, not the view of the website operator.