Our story

• Facebook
• Twitter
• LinkedIn
• Instagram

Gloucestershire Gateway Trust was formed in 2007 bringing together a group of leading local business people and social entrepreneurs.

The Trust secured its charitable status in 2011. However, the idea of creating a motorway services on the M5 which would not only create local jobs but provide a sustainable income to help local communities thrive, first came to Mark Gale, chief executive of Gloucestershire Gateway Trust, in 1994.

“We had 28 million vehicles a year carrying over 40 million people into Gloucestershire at one end and going out the other on the M5. No-one in the communities it passed by got any benefit; it was just seen as a problem bringing pollution, congestion and noise. Now we’ve turned the M5 into a community asset.”

Mark Gale, Chief Executive of Gloucestershire Gateway Trust

A first for the UK

Gloucestershire Gateway Trust and the Westmorland Family are a partnership between a family business and a local regeneration charity, each with a stake in the business and its impact on local people and communities. This project is a first for the UK, demonstrating how charities and businesses can unite around a common interest to generate substantial benefit for both.

Gloucester Services’ partnership with the Trust is not just about charitable donations, it is a more fundamental way of connecting business and community for the benefit of both. Gloucestershire Gateway Trust aim to generate long-term community benefit and sustainable income for charitable partners working in our target communities in Gloucester and Stroud.

Gloucestershire Gateway Trust know that successful long-term regeneration in target neighbourhoods needs the creation of accessible local employment opportunities and new community investment. Working together will deliver these essential elements.

There is a new worldwide movement developing, made up of people with a different vision for their local communities.
 
It is a hand made, home made vision. And, wherever we look it is a culture that starts the same way.
 
First, we see what we have – individually, as neighbours and in this place of ours.
 
Second, we know that the power of what we have grows from creating new connections and relationships among and between what we have.
 
Third, we know that these connections happen when we individually or collectively act to make the connections – they don’t just happen by themselves.

john mcknight

---