The decision to go to the NDC rests on one crucial question you want to ask yourself...
What do I want to get out of the experience?
I use the NDC a lot, during the winter, it has everything I need for maintaining my diving skills during the months when I don't want to or can't go out in a boat - depth and convenience.
Now this sounds like it must be on my door step - it's not. I live in Kent, and it takes me pretty much 2:30-2:45 to get to either Stoney, Vobster or the NDC, but I will ALWAYS choose to go to the NDC over the others for the following reasons:
It's deeper...for what I need. I want to maintain a skill set in deep diving (for trimix wrecks), and the necessity, or the ability to do 50m+ trimix diving throughout the winter is a big bonus.
It's never busy. Because of the shuttle service they run from the car park to the water, everywhere in the carpark is pretty much a prime position. People moan that the deal with the trailer is a pain in the ass - well, it's much less of a pain than walking from the top carpark at stoney with a twiset and a couple of sidemounts, and there is very little variability in this, whether you turn up first thing or at 11am.
Friendliness of staff. The guys that run the place, whether it's the shop, the gate, the gasroom or the burger van, are sooo amenible, you would not believe. How many places can you think of, that it doesn't matter if you want a trimix fill while you wait 30 mins before closing on a saturday, or a burger.....you will almost always go away happy.
Now this is quite a one sided argument so far, and I'm not going to stop here, as the place does have some negatives, but there is good reason for all of them.
The quarry is boring. There is really nothing of interest in there, other than a few boats and things.
The deep area is completely devoid of things to look at - and there is a good reason for this. When building the site, they worked very closely with the HSE and as such there was a requirement to not put anything deep that might attract unqualified people. Personally, if I want to go deep in an inland site, it is for nothing other than practicing skills. I don't need some sort of "attraction" down there, it would only distract from my primary goal.
Living in England I have to pay an extra £4 to go over the toll bridge, than if I went to Vobster of Stoney.
It's cold, whatever the time of year, if you go deep. Recently (June) I was diving there and me and my buddy planned a 60m dive on trimix just to keep things fresh for a deep wreck we were planning a few weekd ahead. The surface temperature, and the temperature we had during our shallow stops was 17 degrees. Not too shabby I hear you say. Well, no, but considering it was still 5 degrees at 60m, the quarry seems to remain damn cold at depth throughout the year. (the bonus was that the vis went from 5m in the shallows, to 20m at depth)
So there we have it, my view on the NDC. If you've not been there before it's well worth a trip, but before you dismiss it, bear in mind exactly what you are aiming to get out of the visit, as for the more advanced divers, there is a very useful, and most importantly, safe, place to practice things, potentially deep things with the knowledge that you are not on your own if the $hit hits the fan.
Take care..
Si