Gridserve has just opened a new flagship charging hub just off the M1 at Markham Vale services near Chesterfield – there are 39 400kW chargers from ABB, spaces for lorries and caravans and a freshly painted coffee shop serving Costa to weary electric car drivers. 

It’s the company’s fifth large hub, but it’s not the future says Electrifying's Best Charging Network for 2026. Why's that then? 

The company has invested millions in its Markham Vale facility, but it says it’s responding to customers in developing its next generation of hubs that will be smaller and easier to deploy around the country. 

Future concepts for Gridserve hubs will see smaller sites (0.3 acres versus the 1.5 acres at Markham Vale) with a more focused food and drink offering and fewer charging spots.  

Which isn’t to say that the company isn’t enthusiastic about its latest opening – when we visited on the open day the plugs were all filled and there was a queue for the hot drinks. 

The shops are open from 6am to 9pm seven days a week, while the charge points themselves are accessible 24 hours a day.

One of the surprises that Gridserve has seen with its charging hubs has been the dwell time of customers. Not that they weren’t stopping long enough to use the services, but rather that they were enjoying them a bit too much. 

Interestingly, despite the talk of the Markham Vale site being as big as the company will go, it has still left itself some room to expand. There are spots for eHGVs and caravans to charge using the same 400kW units as are featured around the rest of the site, but these can easily be swapped out for 1GW (1,000kW) chargers if the demand from electric lorries grows. 

There’s even room at the far end of the site to install more charge points for eHGVs, and any expansion or increase in charger capacity would be enabled through the use of battery tech that trickle charges electricity into storage to redeploy on demand without straining the grid capacity. 

Meanwhile, and most excitingly, if you charge at Markham Vale during July there’s a special offer of 49p per kWh for charging. Just need to find a reason to drive up past Chesterfield…