Motor Coach Station Marshall Street Blackpool

An attempt to mitigate the congestion which has followed the increased use of heavy motor traffic during the holiday seasons will be made shortly at Blackpool. By Easter there will be opened in that town the first fully equipped motor-coach station in the country. The advantages of such an innovation are apparent. From June to September last, and at Easter and Whitsuntide, so many motor coaches arrived daily at Blackpool that special regulations had to be enforced. All drivers now entering the borough are required to proceed immediately to a garage after unloading their vehicles. They are also required to load again at the garage before leaving for the return journey. These regulations have tended to relieve the congestion; but there are still occasions when the available garage accommodation is insufficient for the traffic entering the town. This must be the experience of many other places besides Blackpool, which possesses more than average facilities for garaging. The ameliorative scheme adopted by Blackpool is the result of private enterprise, but it has the approval of the Corporation. The plans for the new station have been prepared by Mr Halstead Best, a Blackpool architect, have been sanctioned by the building Plans Committee, and the work has already begun. The station is situated as centrally as it could be on the north side of Marshall Street, which links up Central Drive, a main artery with which all the important roads are connected, with the sea front. The principal feature of the station is to be a central block of buildings in a large area. There will be a café immediately beyond the main entrance, business offices, cloak-rooms, lavatories, and other conveniences on the left, and an inspection garage, a mechanic’s shed, repair shops, petrol store etc. on the right. The coaches will be distributed in a manner that will ensure a clear roadway, thus permitting the movement of any vehicle when required. It is intended to run a taxi-cab service in connection with the station for the convenience of passengers with luggage who may wish to reach other parts of the town. Although the station is designed primarily for the convenience of vehicles entering the town from remoter districts, it is proposed to provide facilities for local motor-coach proprietors who may wish to use it. This arrangement will be much appreciated now that the local street stands have been abolished. The scheme will please, no doubt, the coach passengers. Under the present haphazard and inadequate system the inconveniences of this form of travelling are many. After long and tiring journeys passengers are almost literally dumped into the roadway with their luggage and left to fend for themselves. The luxury of a wash and brush-up, of a cloakroom where one may leave luggage and all unnecessary impedimenta, of a café where light refreshments may be obtained – these things, under such circumstances are of no mean importance. It is possible that once they have been experienced the demand for them will spread, and we shall become in time as familiar with the motor-coach station as with the railway station. [Manchester Guardian 1 March 1921 page 11]

Blackpool is to have a motor coach station. The idea is not entirely, new, for last summer Bucks Swift fleet inaugurated a station at Manchester, but this was merely a booking-office, cloak-room, café, and general inquiry office, in the centre of the city — a point at which coaches started or concluded their journeys. But the Blackpool station is on a more ambitious scale, and it is expected to be in use by Easter. The site is the piece of ground bounded by Back Street, Marshall Street, Middle Street, and Lancaster Avenue, one minute's walk from the promenade, and the building in the centre of the ground is already in the hands of the contractors. .... This design has been prepared by Mr Halstead, Best, of 1, South King Street, Blackpool, who has had much previous experience in the preparation of plans for motor parks and garages.

The Blackpool motor coach station is intended to combine the facilities of an up-to-date railway station and all its appurtenances with a pronounced regard for all personal comfort and convenience. In various parts of the country where open-air parks for coaches have been in use they have not been outstanding successes owing to the absence °if cloakrooms, inquiry office, etc. Blackpool had an open-air park last year, but it was simply a terminus of the journey; sometimes a very muddy one at that, and nothing more. The plans of Mr Best, which, have been approved by the Building Plans Committee of the Corporation, mark a big advance in coaching comfort. In the first place, the site of the station is within one minute's walk of the Central Station., the busy shopping centre off Central Drive, and the promenade in the other direction. A passenger missing a train to Liverpool or Manchester is likely to find the coach station very convenient. As for passengers arriving at the coach station, desiring to get to the north or other parts of the town, Messrs Shaw intend to inaugurate a service of taxicabs. The station buildings, which were formerly a saw mill, will be reconstructed, so Mr Halstead Best informed our representative, on lines similar to several other depots for motor vehicles designed by him. Because of its easy accessibility from all parts of the district, the motor coach station premises to become the recognized rendezvous for coach traffic. As showing how central is the site, it may be mentioned that the station is within a few seconds of Central Road, along which come the vehicles from the Preston road on the south, vehicles come from Lytham and St. Anne’s along :the Central Drive, and also an the north from Fleetwood. The coaches are to be parked round the boundaries of the site, and this will be done in such a manner that any vehicle (with the few exceptions shown on the plan) will be able to move out along the main passage without interfering with other vehicles. There will be a covered space for about 10 or 12 coaches at the rear of the station, and part of this, space has already, we understand, been let to coach owners coming into Blackpool regularly. After passengers have been unloaded, the coach will proceed to a berth allocated to it by the clerk of the booking office. We surmise that the numbers of these berths, destinations, and owners of the coaches will be posted in the passenger waiting rooms so that they can locate, without any inquiry, the position of the coach immediately prior to setting off on the return trip. Arriving passengers will have the use of the waiting rooms, cafe, and cloak-rooms, where they may leave surplus clothing, luggage, etc., for a small fee. There will be adequate ablutionary facilities, and about 10 lavatories will be provided. Chocolates, sweets, tobacco, tea, sandwiches, cakes, and the whole gamut of eating-house fancies will be on sale at the cafe. In the coach department stocks of spare parts, oils, etc, — in fact, anything that the driver may need—will be kept. The Station will be open day and night, and will have a 24-hour day repair staff. Drivers will have facilities for satisfying their personal needs, and there will be an inspection pit, repair shop, and stores.  It is proposed that the station should also be used by local motor-coach proprietors for short tours from Blackpool, thus abolishing the street stands. The local 'proprietors fear much 'loss of business from this abolition of their privileges. [Commercial Motor, 1 March 1921]

Opened    March 1921

Reference    Manchester Guardian 1 March 1921 page 11 with plan
Reference    Commercial Motor 1 March 1921
Reference    Commercial Motor 15 August 1922
Reference    Commercial Motor 20 March 1923
Reference    Who’s Who in Architecture 1926