Rail depots chosen for London terminal
Page 18
If you've noticed an error in this article please click here to report it so we can fix it.
THREE sites have been pmpointed as London coach terminals to replace Victoria Coach Station in the early Nineties.
London Regional Transport last week published the results of five months initial studies into the future coach terminal requirements of the capital. It plans to conduct more detailed studies over the next six months.
From an initial list of 30 sites, consultants Steer, Davies and Gleave have narrowed the choice to three four-hectare sites at King's Cross Freightliner terminal, Paddington station goods yard and Uxbridge Road depot, White City.
The controversial National Bus Company plan to develop Marylebone station as a coach terminal with access from Neasden by busways through the existing rail tunnels has been r(jected, partly because it would limit access to coaches approaching London from the north-west.
According to LRT planning director David Bayliss, the Marylebone plan is an imaginative idea, hut as the railway is still open, the site is unlikely to be available early enough.
There are also divided views on whether the tunnels
are suitable tor two-way coach traffic, and as the coach station is to be developed as a commercial venture, any insurance costs associated with the tunnel could have a detrimental effect on the project.
"In different circumstances, it has quite a lot to offer," Bayliss told CM.
All of the shortlisted sites are designed with direct access to the Underground system, have street-level parking/boarding space to handle 1,400 coach movements per day and an upper level for passengers who would gain access to boarding islands below.
They are designed to handle 10 million or more passengers a year, putting it on a par with Terminal Four at Heathrow airport and at about 80 per cent of the total annual traffic at Gatwick airport. Annual revenue of £6 million to £7 million is envisaged.
Costs of the three sites range between £40 million and £.50 million, with the King's Cross site being the most expensive as it includes the reopening of York Road station on the Piccadilly line. LRT is prepared to consider a cheaper Underground access alternative.
King's Cross is marginally
closer to central London than the other two sites, but is further away from the important western access corridors than Paddington, which appears to be the favourite of the three.
The detailed studies will investigate how feasible the sites are and how much private capital can be attracted into the development which, in architectural terms, Bayliss describes as being "more like Nine Elms Market rather than the Stock Exchange".
He hopes that it will be possible to have a new terminal in operation by 1990, handling all operators' services and not just those of the current National Express network.
It is needed to take pressure off Victoria, which is attracting environmental objections from influential residents of the surrounding streets, and which could lose part of its site as well as overflow parking facilities at Battersea Wharf.
More imminent, and beyond the hope of immediate salvation by the LRT project, is the closure of Gloucester Road coach station in Kensington as it lacks planning permission. It may even have closed by the time this issue is published.