The East of England Arena and Events Centre in Peterborough no longer operates as an exhibition venue. The site closed on 1 July 2023 for redevelopment, and the shows that ran there moved to other venues. If you are holding an older exhibitor pack or have found a listing in a venue directory, that data is out of date. Below is what is known for certain, what cannot be established today, and how to check a venue before you order a vehicle.
What happened to the site at Alwalton
The venue stood at Alwalton near Peterborough on a site of roughly one hundred and sixty-five acres and for years hosted large outdoor and indoor events. The trade press recorded its closure on 1 July 2023, with the land earmarked for redevelopment. Asset Earning Power Group, which took over the operating company running the site, describes on its own pages a development scheme of around one thousand six hundred and fifty homes plus a leisure element, with a stated intention to retain and improve the arena.
Ownership of the land itself is not consistent across publicly available sources: different accounts name different entities and we could not resolve it, so we do not state an owner. The agricultural society that historically ran the ground still has its offices there but publishes no venue hire page. Nor is there a working official website for the exhibition venue: the domains it operated under do not resolve, and entries on event aggregator sites are archive data rather than a source from the site operator.
Where the shows went
The best known event from the site, the Truckfest commercial vehicle show, now runs elsewhere. The organiser lists its main edition at the Newark and Notts Showground plus further rounds at other English venues. The remaining Peterborough events dispersed across different venues and there is no single successor to the site. The practical conclusion is that you find the location of a new edition from the show organiser, not at the old address.
What this means for a Polish exhibitor
Three things. First, an address from materials a few seasons old is not fit for a transport order, even when the show name still matches. Second, the entry instructions, hall plans and unloading rules from that venue do not carry over to the new one: every venue has its own door layout, its own way of booking vehicles in and its own restrictions. Third, when a show relocates the route changes too, and with it journey time and vehicle choice. How to count a schedule backwards from the build-up window is covered in the article on the build-up and breakdown calendar.
How to check a venue before ordering transport
This lesson is wider than one closed site, because exhibition venues change names, owners and purpose more often than people assume. The order of checks goes like this. First the current stand confirmation from the show organiser, because that is the only document tying a show name to a specific address in a specific year. Then the website of the venue named in that confirmation: is it operating, does it publish exhibitor information, does the name match. Only then navigation and a postcode, preferably the one the venue publishes for deliveries, because it is often different from the correspondence one. Directory and map listings are a hint, not a source. Who is responsible for what along that chain is set out in the article on responsibilities at a trade fair.
Reaching the Peterborough area if the show is nearby
The region itself remains well connected and we serve it normally. The spine is the A1 with its A1(M) sections, with Peterborough on the A605 and a link on the A14 towards the east coast ports and the Midlands. Entering through the east coast ports the final leg is short; entering through the Channel the route runs on the M25 and the A1(M). Peterborough has no charging clean air zone; the British list of such zones covers Bath, Birmingham, Bradford, Bristol, Portsmouth, Sheffield and Tyneside. We describe the region more fully in the article on transport to Cambridge and East Anglia, and corridor choice in the piece on the east coast ports.
What we will not write here
We give no reopening dates and no scope for future exhibition activity on this site, because the publicly available information on that is ambiguous and single-sourced. We do not name an owner for the same reason. Nor do we describe gates, docks or entry rules, because the venue does not currently run an exhibition business and publishes no such materials. If that changes, we will change this article.
What we do when a show changes venue
We take the stand from the previous location or from storage, assemble it and carry it to the new address. The Kielce base sits about 4 km from the fairground, a few minutes away, and works around the clock, so a stand can wait there between shows instead of returning to the exhibitor premises. On the British side the same role is played by the warehouse in Milton Keynes. A season covering several shows is described in the article on one stand, several shows.
Sources
- Exhibition News: East of England Arena closed on 1 July 2023 for redevelopment
- Asset Earning Power Group: the Peterborough showground development scheme
- Truckfest: current event locations after leaving Peterborough
Has your show changed venue and you are unsure how that affects transport? Send the current stand confirmation through the quotation form and we will check the approach and set up the delivery. See also the exhibition logistics page.
