Good and bad bus stations.

[83G/84D]

It seems from another thread that Preston divides opinion so how about your good and bad bus stations around the UK?

Mine are:-

Good:-

Norwich:- Excellent facilities with a decent cafe and toilets and right in the centre of town. Plenty of bus stands including some for lay-overs and information available and clearly displayed for the public.

I must say these comments are based on a 2012 visit so is a little dated.

Bad:-

Winchester:- What a dump! In desperate need of a major refurbishment and puts the rest of the City centre to shame. The whole place from the garage / parking area at the rear to the cramped stands and shabby looking waiting areas leave a lot to be desired.

Now over to you.

 

[ChathillMan]

Good

Derby - Excellent facilities if a little cold in winter

Birkenhead - compact and sheltered

Metro centre - spacious and bright

Bad

bishop Auckland - a selection of metal shelters on an exposed hill

Team valley south bus station - one shelter in a bleak location

 

[Deerfold]

You might find these threads from earlier in the year useful:

Good: http://www.railforums.co.uk/showthread.php?t=61070

Bad: http://www.railforums.co.uk/showthread.php?t=61093

 

[nathanclass323]

Good - Derby, Retford, Mansfield

Bad - Notts Vic, Preston

 

[Deerfold]

Good - Derby, Retford, Mansfield

Bad - Notts Vic, Preston

Want to share why for those that don't know them?

 

[TUC]

Middlesbrough-good fully enclosed and well lit structure, let down by information office now being solely Arriva.

Selby-a few shelters side by side does not constitute a bus station no matter how much it pretends to be.

 

[Robertj21a]

Good - Mansfield (new), Leeds, Glasgow, Norwich

Bad - Hanley (new), Plymouth, Northampton, Nottingham Broadmarsh, Great Yarmouth, Spalding, Chester (new), Preston, Crewe, Exeter, Huntingdon, Ashington, Newcastle-u-L etc etc

Robert

 

[harry42]

Want to share why for those that don't know them?

I'm from round there so heres my opinions:

Derby: Nice interior, bus departure screens, nice and clean.
Retford: Couldn't comment.
Mansfield: Very well organized, generally members of staff around, VERY clean toilets!

Notts Vic: Has recently been refurbished (2-3 weeks ago) with brand new flooring, departure screens and travel 'hutch!' But it still isn't a pleasant place to be at night as you are very close to some undesirable places and it does have strong police presence at times.
Preston: It is unnecessarily big in my opinion but the building is quite nice from the outside

Can I just add another one:
The new stoke on trent bus station is really nice.

 

[ATW Alex 101]

I'm from round there so heres my opinions:

Derby: Nice interior, bus departure screens, nice and clean.
Retford: Couldn't comment.
Mansfield: Very well organized, generally members of staff around, VERY clean toilets!

Notts Vic: Has recently been refurbished (2-3 weeks ago) with brand new flooring, departure screens and travel 'hutch!' But it still isn't a pleasant place to be at night as you are very close to some undesirable places and it does have strong police presence at times.
Preston: It is unnecessarily big in my opinion but the building is quite nice from the outside

Can I just add another one:
The new stoke on trent bus station is really nice.

I prefer the old Mansfield one, alot bigger and a little less complicated to find IMO.

 

[harry42]

I prefer the old Mansfield one, alot bigger and a little less complicated to find IMO.

True, the new one does get very crowded. ie I was waiting for the pronto and the queue must have been 20 people ish and was blocking the aisle. Therefore, everyother bay queues were pushed round making buses late.

 

[TheGrandWazoo]

True, the new one does get very crowded. ie I was waiting for the pronto and the queue must have been 20 people ish and was blocking the aisle. Therefore, everyother bay queues were pushed round making buses late.

A bit older but a great functional design is Middlesbrough. Some of the best are WY ones (e.g. Leeds, Wakefield, Keighley).

Some disappointing ones - Morpeth, Newcastle Haymarket, Bath (which looks great but is too small)

Worst ones.... where to begin - Plymouth, Sunderland, Bishop Auckland (I agree with that), Consett, Gloucester, Lichfield, Llanelli, Oxford, Chester

The worst of all - Northampton and Swindon

Notably, Winchester and Swindon were both due to be redeveloped as part of a larger scheme but when the bottom fell out of the economy and high street retailing, the schemes were shelved.

 

[ValleyLines142]

I have to say, I think Cardiff's bus station is absolutely disgusting. Considering it is the Welsh capital, it is really bad. When people alight at Central Station, the first thing they see when they exit is the bus station.

The stands are really grotty, the benches are hideous and old and are in dire need a refurb into the seats you'd expect on a station platform and they always stink of pee. In fairness, Stand B, where National Express/Greyhound services depart, has nicer seats, but I feel these are only placed here purely for the fact that coach services depart from there.

Also, up until about a year ago, there was an exit straight from the rear of Stand F, across a zebra crossing and along the main square outside of the station. For various reasons that I am unaware of, this exit has now been blocked, and you can now only enter the station from the side gates (for those of you who live in Cardiff/have been there before, you'll know what I mean), which is annoying because you have to go off to the right to then go back to the stands on the left.

In terms of the best bus station, I'd have to say Bridgend. It's a sizeable town, yet not that well-known, but the bus station is absolutely out of this world. It has full live departure boards, it is properly enclosed, it is modern, it has a nice layout, plenty of stands and parking areas and has blue tinted glass. When you compare it with Cardiff, it really puts it to shame. Cracking job!

I also like Bristol bus station, for also the same reasons.

 

[34D]

Good:
Meadowhall - good bus parking, toilets for staff and pax, nice cafe on site, overflow coach parking on shopping centre site

Bad:
London Victoria - too little space, minimal parking and driver facilities
Leeds and Hudd - driver layover miles away from toilets/facilities
Otley and Ilkley - no facilities (not even pax or staff toilets)
York - no bus station at all - collections of stops on Rougier St and outside station don't count

 

[nathanclass323]

Want to share why for those that don't know them?

Would be my pleasure.

Good

Derby - large, airy, practical building that generally provides a nice place to wait for a bus in. The Derby City Council information centre and the trentbarton shop have very helpful staff.

Retford - Nice building, practical and just does it's job.

Mansfield - same as Retford.

Bad

Notts Vic - Just the complete opposite of Derby

Preston - building is outdated. Just about serves a use but completely unsuitable for modern requirements IMO

 

[bb21]

Good - Mansfield (new), Leeds, Glasgow, Norwich

Bad - Hanley (new), Plymouth, Northampton, Nottingham Broadmarsh, Great Yarmouth, Spalding, Chester (new), Preston, Crewe, Exeter, Huntingdon, Ashington, Newcastle-u-L etc etc

Robert

Like the other posts, can you expand on why you think some of these are better than others, for those of us who have not used them before?

 

[Robertj21a]

Like the other posts, can you expand on why you think some of these are better than others, for those of us who have not used them before?

Good:

Mansfield, Leeds, Norwich, Glasgow - all are light, with plenty of information, café, toilets and plenty of stands and layover space.

Bad:-

Hanley - one of the newest bus stations in the UK. Total lack of space for buses. Too many reversing into path of others, some have to then turn in opposite direction to others still reversing. Disaster even from the planning stage.

Plymouth - a dump, drug paradise

Preston - dingy, poor access

Northampton, Nottingham Broadmarsh - under cover, dark.

Great Yarmouth, Spalding, Chester (new), Ashington, Newcastle-u-L - just a few shelters, suggesting that's all they need to call it a bus station.

Huntingdon, Crewe - covered waiting area but little facilities

Robert

 

[TheGrandWazoo]

Good:

Mansfield, Leeds, Norwich, Glasgow - all are light, with plenty of information, café, toilets and plenty of stands and layover space.

Bad:-

Hanley - one of the newest bus stations in the UK. Total lack of space for buses. Too many reversing into path of others, some have to then turn in opposite direction to others still reversing. Disaster even from the planning stage.

Plymouth - a dump, drug paradise

Preston - dingy, poor access

Northampton, Nottingham Broadmarsh - under cover, dark.

Great Yarmouth, Spalding, Chester (new), Ashington, Newcastle-u-L - just a few shelters, suggesting that's all they need to call it a bus station.

Huntingdon, Crewe - covered waiting area but little facilities

Robert

Again, Crewe is another site of a proposed retail development. As such, little money has been spent on it in the last 20 years!

I guess the term "bus station" has no definitive specification as to what facilities it should have. Hence a lonely bus shelter can (and is) termed as a bus station e.g. Cinderford, Monmouth. Then you had the "yard in front of the depot" type though there's fewer of those around now - this used to be the case with Saxmundham, Stokesley, etc

Some more of my favourites - sorry but Preston. I know many don't like it but in a world of identikit bus stations, it does actually have some presence. Other ones I like (though appreciate it's more for traditional and aesthetics) are Taunton (example of pre-war Tilling architecture) and St. Ives (is there a bus station with a nicer setting?)

I agree with the view on Plymouth Bretonside - I just don't feel safe from the assorted druggies and dossers. County Durham has some of the worst from the windswept openness of Bishop Auckland, to the freezing Stalinist inspired design of Stanley, and the just plain depressing Peterlee!

Also, I'm now middle aged so whilst I can't remember the sepia tinted 1950's, I can remember some of the truly horrific ones that have now disappeared. These include Corby (a concrete tunnel with lifts in the middle that produced a vortex of litter), Sunderland Central (the darkest undercover place), Newcastle Marlborough Crescent (a throwback to Victorian days with a wooden shack as a travel office), the old Bristol (never trust a place with underground toilets), Ripon - invariably cold, Edinburgh - with its tunnels from one platform to another. Birmingham Bull Ring - waiting for a bus meant a vast enhanced chance of getting emphysema, such was the air quality!

I sadly never made it to Glasgow and the Anderston bus station - that was apparently "the daddy" of bad bus stations. Hidden under brutalist office blocks, it was also a place where hookers plied for trade and druggies congregated whilst other folk waited for the bus. Not good.

 

[Eagle]

No one's said Coventry (Pool Meadow) yet. I'm nominating it as a good bus station because of its reverseless design, one that's surprisingly uncommon, which speeds up the buses going through it and means that they don't have to cross each other's paths. The one downside is that Centro's access charges for using it mean that Stagecoach refuse to call there.

And a bad one: Poole (Kingland Road). It's just a canopy bolted onto the side of a shopping centre and the stances are right in front of the shops, meaning that people waiting for buses get in the way of people going to shops and vice versa. Plus there always seem to be half a dozen out-of-service buses parked up opposite the stances, which makes it harder for buses to get in and out of it.

 

[ATW Alex 101]

Ellesmere Port has a pretty good bus station, just need to clear the tramps away and place a few flower pots andthey could make it a prettier place. The design is like a chinese type one, but that maybe just me.

 

[northwichcat]

Good-

Doncaster
Rotherham
Warrington

All clean, tidy, modern with indoor waiting area.



Bad -

Knutsford

Non-accessible. Falling to pieces. Last modification was part of the Booths Supermarket development in 1990.

 

[brompton rail]

Bus stations in South Yorkshire.......

Sheffield Pond Street - quite good but not as well used as it used to be. Slightly desolate and without doors.

Doncaster Frenchgate - excellent, with automatic doors on all entrances, well lit, warm, cleaned very well, including toilets. Escalators link directly to Frenchgate Shopping Centre and a variety of eating places. Covered walkway connects to Doncaster Railway station (2 mins) for rail connections. No reversing buses!

Barnsley - very similar to Doncaster but lighter as it isn't under a shopping centre. Railway station and Bus station are in same building with connecting footbridge and escalators / lifts. Similarly well kept.

Rotherham has an older bus station.

Hull bus station is similar to Doncasters and is adjacent to the railway station.

 

[Robertj21a]

No one's said Coventry (Pool Meadow) yet. I'm nominating it as a good bus station because of its reverseless design, one that's surprisingly uncommon, which speeds up the buses going through it and means that they don't have to cross each other's paths. The one downside is that Centro's access charges for using it mean that Stagecoach refuse to call there.

And a bad one: Poole (Kingland Road). It's just a canopy bolted onto the side of a shopping centre and the stances are right in front of the shops, meaning that people waiting for buses get in the way of people going to shops and vice versa. Plus there always seem to be half a dozen out-of-service buses parked up opposite the stances, which makes it harder for buses to get in and out of it.

Agree with Coventry but it's just so under-used. Such a waste of a good space.

Totally agree with the other comment re Corby, probably the worst in England. Mind you, nobody has nominated the old dump that was Luton bus station.

Robert

 

[northwichcat]

Rotherham has an older bus station.

It may be older than other bus stations in South Yorkshire but I'm sure many towns would love a bus station which looks like this: http://upload.wikimedia.org/wikiped...am_Interchange_-_geograph.org.uk_-_464175.jpg
--- old post above --- --- new post below ---

Totally agree with the other comment re Corby, probably the worst in England. Mind you, nobody has nominated the old dump that was Luton bus station.

Blackpool Talbot Road bus station is so bad that National Express moved to an unsheltered stop because it was better and the other buses tend to stop on the road outside the bus station because of how bad the inside is.

 

[overthewater]

BAD:

Falkirk
Cumbernauld
Perth
Ayr

Words can not describe the hellish place the first two are like.

Old Haymarket undercover station in Newcastle, ( it been closed what 3 years now, it should have closed 30 years ago!)

 

[deltic1989]

Awful

Ladies and Gentlemen I give you what is in my opinion the single worst bus station in the whole Kingdom:
Lincoln City Bus Station.



Reasons:
> It looks despicable, what an eyesore, it really brings down the rest of the City Centre and gives a really bad impression of the city as a whole as weather you arrive by bus or rail it's one of the first things you see.

> It leaks.....badly. When it is raining you get wetter inside than you would outside.

> It hasn't been fit for purpose for years. It's always overcrowded, and you get choked by diesel fumes every moment you are in there.

> It is not a place you want to spend any amount of time in after sunset, it's very poorly lit, and is a haven for the less than pleasant part of Lincoln's population.

>It really lacks in facilities and the ones that are there you wouldn't really want to use. The toilets look like they haven't been cleaned for 10 years, and the McColls news stand looks like a throwback from some 1950's film.

> The council have been talking about renovating the bus station or knocking it down and starting again, but as with most council's it's all talk and nothing has been done despite them having been talking about it for nearly 10 years.

 

[trentside]

I can't add anything to what deltic1989 has said, apart from saying that the day that hell hole is consigned to history the better. I can't really see it stirring up the same controversy as Preston somehow

Lincolnshire doesn't really excel with its bus stations. Skegness really isn't great - just a long brick shelter with some benches in it, though at least it has an information office. Boston is even worse, with just a collection of shelters, described recently as dirty and smelly and in dire need to replacement. The same sentiments can also be expressed about Spalding, Louth and (heading into North East Lincs) Grimsby.

I've got to agree with other posters that Retford is an excellent example of a modern bus station. A big plus point for me is that it has a staff presence for the majority of the day, who do a great job of keeping the bus station and toilets clean and free of trouble makers.

 

[jammy36]

No one's mentioned it yet, but I'd have to put Maidstone (Chequers) Bus Station firmly in the bad - dark, slippery, smelly, not easily accessed and confusing for new users. It is basically a dark road under a car park, with a couple of corridors either side for waiting areas.

For those not familiar - here's its welcoming exterior - the dark hole the ramp is leading down into is the bus station!

http://www.geograph.org.uk/photo/1376682

 

[Trainfan344]

Great Yarmouth, Market Gates is a bad bus station, built under a shopping center so it is loud, noisy and dark, and not very well signposted for pedestrians.

 

[anthony263]

I have to say, I think Cardiff's bus station is absolutely disgusting. Considering it is the Welsh capital, it is really bad. When people alight at Central Station, the first thing they see when they exit is the bus station.

The stands are really grotty, the benches are hideous and old and are in dire need a refurb into the seats you'd expect on a station platform and they always stink of pee. In fairness, Stand B, where National Express/Greyhound services depart, has nicer seats, but I feel these are only placed here purely for the fact that coach services depart from there.

Also, up until about a year ago, there was an exit straight from the rear of Stand F, across a zebra crossing and along the main square outside of the station. For various reasons that I am unaware of, this exit has now been blocked, and you can now only enter the station from the side gates (for those of you who live in Cardiff/have been there before, you'll know what I mean), which is annoying because you have to go off to the right to then go back to the stands on the left.

In terms of the best bus station, I'd have to say Bridgend. It's a sizeable town, yet not that well-known, but the bus station is absolutely out of this world. It has full live departure boards, it is properly enclosed, it is modern, it has a nice layout, plenty of stands and parking areas and has blue tinted glass. When you compare it with Cardiff, it really puts it to shame. Cracking job!

I also like Bristol bus station, for also the same reasons.

You have got it spot on with Cardiff Bus Station. You remeber my trip to London on 5th August this year where I had to wait there from 0055 to 0240 for the 0245 national express service to London. There is always a lot of people including the police and taxi drivers since National Express and Greyhound run from there 24/7.

Bridgend being my local bus station is brilliant especially compared to teh old bus stations at Cheapside and on the current site which were a bit like Cardiff Bus Station

Blackwood and Swansea Quadrant bus stations are both lovely Swansea's is in fact the way to do it and Cardiff Council should be taking notes.

The terminus at John Street in Porthcawl is terrible as there is only 3 shelters which leak and cannot accomodate many people godd thing service X2 & 63/63B run every 15 minutes so you dont have to wait long.

Newport (South Wales) is another terrible facility I had to regulary catch a bus from there last christmas when I was working for parcelforce. The place was friezing.

The bus station in Llanelli the last time I used it was okish but I have heard it has been redeveloped again (Greenback is it just a lot of shelters again?)

 

[quarella]

the old Bristol (never trust a place with underground toilets),

I think it was after 1990 the underground toilets were installed utilising the subway which had, in the early years of the bus station led to a second platform. The toilets used to be on the back wall to the right of the inspectors' cabin if memory serves. When they were moved downstairs a charge was made for any use instead of 2p for a cubicle which meant my family would use the free ones in the Bear Pit.