Killamarsh is a town located in the north of the district of North East Derbyshire. It is situated approximately 9.5 miles from Chesterfield and approximately 9 miles from Sheffield. It has a population of approximately 9,500, and the town is a service centre for the surrounding area.
Killamarsh has a variety of independent shops, hair and beauty, and cafes to choose from if you are visiting the town.
Future Plans for Killamarsh
North East Derbyshire District Council, working alongside Killamarsh Parish Council and Derbyshire County Council, undertook a locality review of the town centre, part-funded through the One Public Estate initiative. This review included not only a look at publicly owned sites and premises within the town centre, and potential future uses for them, but also looked at privately owned land and premises that were connected to publicly owned land to see if this could be better used to form part of a larger, transformative regeneration programme. From this report, a number of project areas and recommendations were made.
The recommendations and chosen options from both reports will now be examined in much more detail, with illustrative master plans drawn up, as well as business cases developed. Once completed, this will then form the basis for the Council’s future regeneration funding applications to the Government’s schemes.
A Locality Review Report, produced in June 2021, presents a comprehensive analysis of the town and its context in the regional scale to date. The report gives an important baseline for understanding the town’s challenges.
You can view the Killamarsh Locality Review Report by contacting Economic Development.
Barrow Hill Railway Line
The vision to re-connect communities between Sheffield and Chesterfield to the heavy rail network, by reinstating stations and a new passenger service on the existing Barrow Hill freight line, is set to become a reality.
A partnership of the Strategic Partners Network Rail, DfT, Northern Rail, Local transport Authorities in the South Yorkshire Mayoral Combined Authority and Derbyshire County Council came together to work to provide provision for reinstating a train line through Killamarsh (a route from Sheffield to Chesterfield).
In 2020 the Central Government pledged £500million nationally for the Restoring Your Railway Programme, and Barrow Hill was one of 10 successful bids to be awarded funding.
A proposal to compile an Outline Business Case is due to be submitted by September 2024 with the design stage to be complete by January 2025.
Exploring the district
Westhorpe Nature Reserve is located to the south of the settlement and connected by recreational routes via the Trans Pennine Trail.
Rother Valley Country Park lies to the north connected by public footpaths and cycle routes from the town centre. The Country Park includes several ponds and lakes, with the surrounding area landscaped to form a nature reserve recreation area, with facilities for water sports. This wide network of national trails, cycleways and public footpaths link Killamarsh to the surrounding countryside.
There is also a theme park and golf course located nearby.
The route of the old Chesterfield Canal, which runs through the town, is now the site of a traffic-free former canal towpath, which runs parallel to popular walking and cycling routes. The ongoing restoration works along the canal path will extend the route through Killamarsh towards Kiveton (in Rotherham’s District) to the North East, hopefully eventually linking the whole of the former Chesterfield Canal route. Killamarsh is the largest town on the remaining length of canal yet to be restored. The original line of the canal in the town has been heavily built upon, and a diversion route has been proposed to one day restore the actual canal, with land safeguarded to enable this to happen. Processes are underway to investigate the feasibility of different options available to ultimately turn this aspiration into a reality.
If you would like to find out about accommodation, places to visit and eat, please click the link and you will be directed to our “Explore the district” pages
Transport and Parking
Killamarsh, to the south of the city of Sheffield, serves a rural population. The A57 linking Sheffield with Worksop is a few miles north of the town and Junction 30 of the M1 is just a couple of miles south of the town along the A6135 through Eckington and Renishaw.
As with all North East Derbyshire Council owned car parks, free car parks are within close reach of the town centre.
In terms of buses, in May 2024 a new service 80 was introduced to the First Bus network linking Killamarsh in North East Derbyshire with Chesterfield. The service runs hourly throughout the majority of the day, 7 days a week. It currently goes from Chesterfield, to the Royal Hospital and then Brimington, Staveley, Mastin Moor and Killamarsh before terminating at Crystal Peaks, replacing the service previously operated by Hulleys of Baslow.
The First Bus network in South Yorkshire has extended its 120 service from Sheffield . This means that every hour a bus goes to Killamarsh from nearby Halfway, so linking with the tram system into Sheffield, reinstating the link to the city and providing a new service for North Derbyshire residents to the Hallamshire Hospital.
There are also bus links between the areas of Sheffield, Doncaster, Rotherham, North east Derbyshire and Chesterfield.
Property and Estates
If you are interested in finding out about the business or retail units in Killamarsh please email the Economic Development Team in the first instance who will help you with your enquiry.
Financial support
Grant funding is available for businesses and landlords to improve their street facing commercial properties within the district of North East Derbyshire, especially those within our town centres and on our high streets.
Aimed at making our town centres and high streets more inviting and vibrant places for residents and visitors to enjoy, grants will be available from a minimum of £500 to a maximum of £10,000, a contribution of up to 75% of total project costs.
Shopfront Enhancement Scheme - North East Derbyshire District Council (ne-derbyshire.gov.uk)
Research
The Economic Development team regularly collate data such as the types of businesses present in the town centres, footfall numbers and visitor trends to each town to help inform the Council’s plans for future developments and improvements. You can see what this includes for Killamarsh by visiting the link to our Research and Strategies page.
Business Networking
If you would like to get involved with local business networking, please get in touch with us.
Killamarsh Parish Council
If you would like to find out what is happening locally within Killamarsh please visit the Parish Council website News | Killamarsh Parish Council (killamarsh-pc.gov.uk)
For further information please contact the Economic Development team by emailing