Piccadilly Bus Station, Parker Street, Piccadilly Gardens

Manchester Corporation Town Planning Committee's protest against the use of precast concrete bus shelters in Piccadilly has been successful. The Transport Committee decided yesterday that when the bus station is moved to the Parker Street side of Piccadilly the new shelters will be of steel and glasssimilar to those new being completed in Albert Square. Recently the Town Planning Committee said that precast concrete shelters could not be tolerated in Piccadilly, where a thirteen-storey hotel and a 23- storey block of offices, costing more than £2 million, are to be built. The chairman, Councillor S. Jolly, said that the committee wanted shelters which would harmonise with this new development, and while precast concrete might be cheaper the shelters would look like cattle shippons. The transport committee yesterday approved a design for the main shelter to be built in the new bus station. Designed by the City Architect. Mr Leonard C. Howitt, it is 622 feet long, and 575 feet of it will be enclosed. The tallest part in the centre. 14 feet high, will house the staff canteen and inspector's office.  The new station is planned to reduce congestion in two ways: it will cater only for the shorter routes (longer-distance buses will use a new station to be built between Chorlton Street and Sackville Street); and buses will be able to turn round in the station itself instead of going round Piccadilly Gardens as they do now. [Manchester Guardian 17 April 1957 page 14]

Reference      Manchester Guardian 17 April 1957 page 14