Royal Ordnance Factory - Siting of The ROFs

Siting of The ROFs

The new ROFs were to be built in areas regarded as "relatively safe", which until 1940 meant from Bristol in the south and then west of a line that ran from (roughly) Weston-super-Mare in Somerset northwards to Haltwhistle, Northumberland; and then northwestwards to Linlithgow in Scotland. The South, South East and East of England were regarded as "dangerous" and the Midlands area, including Birmingham as "unsafe". This definition of "safe" area was later changed, and in 1940 ignored in the case of ROF Chorley.

Siting of the individual ROFs north and west of this line was of vital importance. ROFs involved with explosive manufacture or filling needed, on safety grounds, to be located away from centres of population. However they needed access to good transport links, such as railways; the availability of adequate workers within reasonable travelling distance; a plentiful guaranteed supply of clean process water; and (to avoid the danger of frozen explosives) tended to be located at or just above sea Level. Some ROFs located in Wales and Scotland were the result of political lobbying as these areas had high unemployment rates in the 1930s. The ROFs were guarded by what was to become the Ministry of Defence Police Force.