The £10 million Welsh business park that still has no businesses
Lewis Smith, local democracy reporter
In a rural area near Bridgend on the borders of the Vale of Glamorgan, there are currently a series of unused roads and pavements that lead to nowhere.
Positioned between the M4 and A48, Brocastle Business Park was built to give an economic boost to the area, with the £10 million site funded by the Welsh Government with the aim of creating thousands of jobs.
However, despite numerous plots of land being ready and waiting to be filled by businesses, there is no hum of machinery or chatter of workers, just an eerie silence as none of the land has yet been occupied.
The business park was completed in November 2021 on land next to the A48, around five miles away from junction 35 of the M4.
Stimulus
It was built with Welsh Government funding to provide a “substantial stimulus to employment opportunities” with outline planning consent for up to 770,000sq feet of floor space.
The works were carried out by a local civil engineering contractor and funded with more than £10 million from the Welsh Government, including around £6.2 million awarded through the European Regional Development Fund.
An additional £2 million was also given to the project to link the new employment site to Waterton with an Active Travel Route.
At the time of the opening, the then Minister for Economy Vaughan Gething said the “significant investment” had been made for the plans that he hoped would lead to the creation of many new jobs.
Key roads
However, despite the completion of key roads and provision for nine plots at the site, as of August 2025, none appear to have been used with marketing agents still showing all of them as being available.
Local Community Councillor Keith Hughes said he like others felt the area was still in need of more jobs adding that he hoped the investment at the site would eventually pay off.
The Welsh Government said they were still confident that this would be the case, with negotiations on two of the plots currently taking place and others being “actively marketed”.
A spokesperson said: “Since substantial completion of the development plots, Brocastle has received a number of serious enquiries from interested parties.
“We are currently negotiating offers on two of the nine plots, one to a developer and one to an owner occupier.
“The remaining plots continue to be actively marketed by commercial property agents and have been attracting steady interest.
“We remain confident that the site will attract further investment to Bridgend and be home to many new jobs in the coming years.”
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This sounds like an initiative Vaughan would have pushed forwards.
Assuming there is sufficient broadband access… it might be worth considering the prices that are being marketed. Attracting businesses to an area is a bit different, it’s not as if satisfying a demand where they are coming already and just need somewhere to base and you can practically charge them any price. You need to offer them something that makes the site the most attractive option. Clearly there has been a failure to understand this, the site isn’t in a particularly desirable area, but it would be hugely beneficial to the local area if businesses were there so I can… Read more »
So which councillor previously owned the field and 10million is a lot to spend on a road to some fields
Typical welsh government, identify a demand for a business park then build one to find there are no takers, £10.000.000 could have been used to help real people with real problems instead of government fantasy’s.
These business parks are everywhere. The government actually believes if they build an empty shell it leads to business? If the assembly wants to help businesses, lower business rates, don’t even think about a tourist tax, leave farmers alone. That’s 3 ways of increasing tax revenue and it didn’t cost £10 million.
Start by fixing the the M4 car park if you want investment.
Unfortunately Welsh government will never accept that they are perceived as as anti Business , anti wealth and that their policies appear to businesses to confirm this . A classic example is the only high speed access route into Wales , I recall watching Drakeford upon his appointment as first minister being asked about the relief roads , it was crystal clear he had no intention of letting it proceed . That same arterial route has many fifty limits which hamper freight transport at night , why not relieve those after a certain time ? The new heads of the… Read more »
Wales used to be Number One for inward investment. Now it’s Number None. This is nothing to do with investors wanting access to the Single European Market. Nothing to do with Brexit. Perish the very thought.