The London Terminal Coach Station

28/11/12 - 15:46

Berisford's posting of the Central London Transport Station reminded me of a photo that's intrigued me, of the London Terminal Coach Station, taken around 1931, looking quite new. It may not be related to what Berisford is after, but the photo raises questions of its own, such as where it was, during what period did it operate and does the building still exist? The GJ/GO/GF coach registrations are South-West London. Sadly, the slip boards are illegible, but the wording on the coach rear is 'Blue Belle'. The photo copyright is AEC Ltd and the exclusive 'body' (excuse the pun) of Regal I's suggests a posed photo, maybe just prior to it opening.!

Chris Hebbron

29/11/12 - 07:14

Chris Hebbron's photo of the London Terminal Coach Station was apparently used in an advert by AEC to show how many operators used that make. According to the Commercial Motor of April 30th 1929 the Station was at Kennington Oval with a frontage of 200ft on the Clapham Road and extending back about 850ft towards Vauxhall.
If you look at Google's Street View of Clapham Road the premises of Europcar seem to be about 200ft wide and the flats to the left are called Coachmans Terrace. The original premises which were at the back of the plot appear to have been demolished.

Nigel Turner

29/11/12 - 07:14

The rather splendid looking London Terminal coach station was opened as an independent operation in 1929; it was in Clapham Road near the Oval. Early long distance users included Standerwick/Scout and Greyhound.
In the later thirties it was bought by Red and White, and became the terminus for some Associated Motorways services which operated via Victoria; it was completely destroyed by bombing in 1940.

David Todd

01/12/12 - 07:20

Thx, Nigel/David, for the info on the London Terminal Coach Station. How confusing it must have been to have all these different termini.

Chris Hebbron

01/12/12 - 07:21

David Todd is only partially right about the fate of London Terminal Coach Station, it did receive bomb damage in the war but afterwards the restaurant, waiting room and booking offices were rebuilt as car showrooms. In 1979 it was stated that the premises were in use by Keith & Boyle as a Vauxhall dealership and the the clock was still keeping perfect time. Obviously the main building has been subsequently demolished.

Nigel Turner

31/07/13 - 09:05

Its some months since the last posting on this topic, but - and if nobody else is interested I hope Chris might still be - I've done a bit of digging around and have managed to piece together a bit more of the history of this operation.
It was planned by Blue Belle Motors Ltd to provide facilities for that company's own coastal express services, but was expanded and named London Terminal Coach Station when it was realised that other companies operations required facilities.
Perhaps I should say something about Blue Belle. Brixton-based Blue Belle Motors Ltd was one of the "big six" London suburban coastal express operators of the late 1920s/early 1930s. Blue Belle Motors Ltd was registered in 1927 to carry on the business of Blue Belle Transport Ltd, itself registered in 1923 - although the origins of the company as Blue Belle Coaches appear to go back to 1921. In November 1936 the shareholding of Blue Belle Coaching Services Ltd, as it become, was acquired by Red & White Services Ltd [sic], although the registered office of the company had been at LTCS (82 Clapham Road) since 1934 - see below. Sometime towards the end of WWII or just after Red & White sold Blue Belle on to another of the "big six", Balham-based United Service Transport Ltd. United operated Blue Belle as a subsidiary until 1966, when it disposed of its various coaching interests to George Ewer/Grey-Green - United continued with haulage operations for a little while longer.
Right, back to LTCS. The station - which opened for business in 1929 - was built on a private park, known as The Shrubbery, which adjoined the the gardens of two opposing rows of houses: the site itself was just off Clapham Road being separated from the main road by Palfrey Place, and extending to Carroun Road. Construction of an entrance to the station required the demolition of certain properties. That being done, the station forecourt was 100ft wide and 200ft long, behind which was a further 650ft length of covered accommodation including six kerb-high arrival/departure platforms. Either side of the forecourt were buildings housing booking offices, restaurant, waiting room/buffet, tobacconists, cloak-room, and (limited) office accommodation for companies using the station. The station itself was owned by a specially-created company, Coach Travels Ltd.
Unfortunately, the suburban location of the station - despite it being only a few minutes walk away from The Oval Underground station - meant that it didn't realise the initial hopes pinned on it; competition was provided by the Central London Coach Station (between King's Cross and Russell Square) which had opened the previous year, and King's Cross Coach Station which was in the planning. Companies that did use LTCS (and some used more than one terminal) included: Alexandra Motor Coaches, Southsea; Majestic Express Motors and Finglands, Manchester; MacShanes Motors, Imperial Motor Services, and Albatross Roadways, Liverpool; Bush & Twiddy, Norwich/Great Yarmouth; Empires Best, Wood Green (operating London-Clacton); Scout and Standerwick, Blackpool/Preston. Usage of the station gradually declined as the independent operators sold out to BET/Tilling/TBAT ownership who consolidated their operations at the London Coastal Coaches-owned Victoria Coach Station.
In February 1933 the lease of the station was sold by auction - the buyers being Red & White Services Ltd [sic], through General Travel Agency (London) Ltd. The reasons for the sale LTCS are probably related to its failure to realise its initial potential, its subsequent decline in use, and the need by Blue Belle to raise capital: Blue Belle was the least robust of the "big six" and had suffered badly following the 1930 Traffic Act and the subsequent withdrawal of Birch Bros Ltd from the London coastal express market (this allowed the rest of the "big six" [including United] to share out the Birch licences amongst themselves whilst swapping pick-up points between each other to maximise efficiency - Blue Belle was not included in these arrangements because, it has been surmised, the other companies felt its financial position was so weak that it was likely to cease trading).
Anyway, LTCS soldiered on under Red & White ownership - with Blue Belle being its main user - until coach services were suspended for the war. During the war, whilst the premises were being used for the war effort (what exactly?) there was, as mentioned in previous postings, some bomb damage to the rear of the covered station. After the war the covered station and the buildings along one side of the forecourt were converted into car show-rooms, with the buildings along the other side of the forecourt being converted into office/Reception facilities.
In 1979 the premises were still operating as a Vauxhall/Bedford dealership under the ownership of Keith & Boyle (London) Ltd - one-time owners of Orange Luxury Coaches of Brixton and Shamrock & Rambler of Bournemouth - who were by then themselves part of BET.
After 1979? I haven't got a clue! although it appears from previous postings that the premises have now been demolished. (In putting this response together I have to acknowledge source material from: Vintage Bus Annual No1, 1979; Grey-Green and contemporaries, 2007; "Hello . . . Coastal" The story of Victoria Coach Station, 2006.)

Philip Rushworth

31/07/13 - 11:52

Well, Philip, I confess to be taken aback by your comprehensive reply; and so long after my original posting! It makes fascinating reading, with two or three links back to other aspects I've previously intoned on OBP. For example, in my photo, I identified the rear of the only coach with its back to the camera as showing ownership by Blue Belle. Understandably, they wanted their two penn'orth of attention! And there again, you also mention one user as being Albatross Roadways of Liverpool, a company which ran non-stop 'sleeping cars' between Liverpool and London and wrote about. And Red & White's tentacles spread wider than I would have previously thought.
I've been puzzled about never seeing any sign of the buildings, as I lived between the Oval and Stockwell Tube Stations, (although nearer Stockwell), just off Clapham Road for some 18 months in 1959-60. The fact that the complex did not front onto Clapham Road explains that.
Thank you for taking the trouble to fill in the gaps and making the subject a good, single, reference source for others.

Chris Hebbron

31/07/13 - 17:02

This item may be nothing to do with the Coach Station mentioned here, but I can not find anything about it, either on the internet or flickr.
It is a 78 rpm record sleeve (remember them - I am sure most readers of this site do).
It is advertising 'Great Coach Station' Phone No UP 4242 (4 lines) Lee Green.
Anybody have any information?

Stephen Howarth

01/08/13 - 06:40

I used to work for PO Telephones/BT and was puzzled by your typing "Phone No UP 4242 (4 lines) Lee Green". The record cover actually states; RING UP 4242 (4 LINES) LEE GREEN. The exchange is not UP, and the person not LEE GREEN, but Lee Green is the exchange name and is/was based in Lewisham. What it is actually stating is "Ring up Lee Green 4242 (4 lines)". So the whole cover relates to the Lewisham district, for what it's worth.

Chris Hebbron

01/08/13 - 11:17

It's an age thing, Chris: ring up is what we GOM's (Grumpy Old Men) used to do with our telephones when it was OK to put the exchange name after the number in case someone thought the name in front of the number was yours. This also enabled signwriters to put the number in the middle of the back panel of the bus, balanced on each side.

Joe

01/08/13 - 18:21

A similar photograph appears in "Kaleidoscope of Char-a-bancs and Coaches" by Stan Lockwood. This was published, date unknown, by Marshall, Harris and Baldwin, 17, Air Street, London, W.1.(Could this have been the late Prince Marshall?)
This is a good read with many interesting facts especially about the early days.

Paragon

09/11/13 - 13:02

Hi just stumbled on your website great to see a picture of the old building. I started my apprenticeship at Keith and Boyle Ltd Vauxhall and Bedford dealers. It was a huge workshop starting with new Vauxhalls then Bedford workshop then cars, at the rear was the body and trim shop. I left in around 1974, I think there are flats there now.

Steve Govett

08/06/14 - 07:40

Sorry to be late to join this conversation, but readers may nevertheless like to know that English Heritage have just published online aerial photographs of the Keith and Boyle garage, from their Aerofilms archive. These show just how extensive the operation must have been, the premises stretching back several hundred feet from Clapham Road. Here's the link for anyone who might be interested: www.britainfromabove.org.uk/image/

Jonathan Lingham

09/06/14 - 06:59

Jonathan - That really is an excellent view of the whole site - as of 1953.

Chris Hebbron

10/06/14 - 07:54

Referring back to my previous post, from the aerial photograph - and their are views from other angles at the site (thanks for posting). 1) You can see how the station was built on a private garden belonging to the terraces on either side: one day you've a nice garden "out back", the next a bloody coach station - so why was the garden sold? did the lease expire, and Blue Belle make a better offer?? or were the occupants of the terraces feeling the financial pinch in the depression and so sold-off "The Shrubbery" to reduce outgoings/raise income to keep their houses???. 2) You can see where property was demolished along the frontage of the station to provide the new office etc building and access between (although the developers do seem to have tried to match the new buildings in with the terraces on either side). 3) A public road (mentioned in my earlier post) runs between the office buildings and the coach station building proper. 4) Half way down its length the left-hand terrace running alongside the station is broken, (?)with what look like 10(?) "prefabs" - were those terrace houses destroyed by the bomb which caused damage to the coach station? And don't the photographs just show what a rotten layout the coach station had - imagine entering that shed for a coach parked towards its rear end, or imagine manoeuvring a coach in those gloomy depths.

Philip Rushworth

11/06/14 - 07:58

This thread was started in response to a question I posed a couple of years ago, as such I'd like to add. The Station wasn't built in the gardens of properties on Fentiman Road & Richbourne Terrace. When the dwellings were built (1870-80) an ornamental garden / park was established between the two rows, no doubt provided by the developer as an incentive to buy a property in that location. It doesn't appear to have been maintained very well and does disappear from maps around 1900. I should think the locals would have welcomed the station development......

Berisford Jones

11/06/14 - 15:50

Nice to see your name popping up again, Berisford and resolving the question of how the site came to be. I knew the area well from the 40's to early 60's, travelling alone up on the tram from South Wimbledon to just North of Stockwell from about age 8 to see two aunts who lived nearby. One lived on the top floor, which were servants quarters, with low ceilings and smaller windows. The other lived on the first floor and only had gas lighting, since her husband believed, when electricity was installed in the 1930's, that electricity could get out in the night and electrocute you! A few houses in the road had an archway which lead originally to a small stable and place for a carriage. How sad the area looked then, but now it's very well-to-do! Just South of the LTCS site is Albert Square (No, not THAT one, silly!) which is a gem, with its garden in the centre and 1840's four-storey houses. Brought back from the dead, just look here.
In my time, it was either Stockwell or Oval, but estate agents now like to call it Vauxhall, which justifies sky-high prices. They wouldn't want a coach station there now! Incidentally, the trams were E1's, as Felthams were too long safely to get round two sharp right-angled bends approaching Wimbledon.
Sorry I digress. Happy memories.

Chris Hebbron

12/06/14 - 08:34

To be fair, the fact about the location being on the park/garden was mentioned last year by Philip Rushworth in his comment above.......and yes Chris, I agree, the residents wouldn't want a coach station there now.

Berisford Jones

12/06/14 - 08:35

Berisford, that's what I wrote - the coach station was built on a shared garden/green space called "The Shrubbery" . . . possibly called-so because, as you've added, it eventually fell into disrepair and the shrubs/bushes took over. We're not in disagreement here!

Philip Rushworth

30/06/14 - 14:42

What a fascinating story!
I came across your site and this item purely by accident in one of those delightful sequences of events that just happen sometimes. I was looking on Ebay for anything to do with the Westerham branch line in Kent, the subject of an intended book, when I came across a leaflet for Blue Belle Coaches, advertising a new 1930 service from Westerham to Charing Cross. A Google search for Blue Belle led on to your site.
Google Maps/Streetview shows that there is now a Mews development, Usborne Mews, on the rear part of the site - perhaps a sensible use of such a long, thin strip of land - and it is possible now to walk right through from Palfrey Place to Carroun Road. Both walls (north and south) of the coach station seem to survive and there are still a lot of shrubs around: here is a link to a Google street view.

Ron Strutt

20/01/15 - 07:00

Here is a February 1931 article, by Commercial Motor magazine, about the London Terminal Coach Station, written some two years after it opened.
It certainly had some very extensive facilities on-site and around thirty regular coach users. It can be seen at this link.
Two months later, in April, there's another article about the merger of both the The London Terminal and Central London Coach Stations. Read more at this link.

Chris Hebbron

23/01/15 - 12:12

I notice, from Ian's Bus Stop website, that something approaching 50 London Transport 'pre-war' RT's were stored at LTCS for varying periods between July 1940 and April 1942, awaiting modification to their brakes (others were stored elsewhere). That's an awful lot of buses, so perhaps the coach station was closed for the duration. A slight aside, but LT must have been gutted to find most of their 151 newest buses off the road at any one time, at such a critical period.

Chris Hebbron

23/01/15 - 13:10

Chris, I should have thought that keeping a valuable fleet of brand new buses in such a vulnerable location during the London Blitz was ill advised in the extreme, but London Transport was ever on a planet of its own.

Roger Cox

25/01/15 - 06:25

Agreed, Roger, but their only early wartime disaster that occurred (22 October 1940) , as far as I can recall, was at Bull Yard, Peckham, where they lost 48 stored vehicles in the Blitz, including all but one of the 12 virtually new private hire TF’s, the survivor, by luck, being used on private hire work at the time, which it stayed on, not being converted to a wartime ambulance; lasting until 1952.
At least these were not working, easily-moved vehicles, unlike those at Croydon Garage on which, during the night of May 10 1941, two bombs fell. Most of the buses in the garage had been re-fuelled, ready for work the next day, which added to the conflagration, destroying the building and 65 buses with it.. Why weren’t these dispersed around nearby streets? After all, the Blitz was still in full swing, although about to ease."

Chris Hebbron

27/01/15 - 06:50

I can remember visiting this site several times during the mid 1970's when it was a Vauxhall dealer's premises. At the time I was employed by Vauxhall Motors as a fleet engineer covering the whole of East Anglia plus all London north of the Thames as far west as Littlewick Green. On my first visit I recognised it from an article in the excellent magazine 'Old Motor' that was in print from the 1960's to the late 1970's. At the time it still looked much the same as it had in the 1930's. Happy days!

John Barringer

27/01/15 - 17:25

Are you sure you that this was the site you visited, John, for it's SOUTH of the Thames.

Chris Hebbron

29/11/16 - 08:47

Fascinating history of the old coach station, in Clapham Rd.
I served my apprenticeship there, starting in 1976 to around 1980.
I had so much fun there, not only in learning a trade, which lasted 30 years, but the guys I meet there, some who keep in contact today. There I learnt how to drive, cars, vans, and my favorite, the trucks. I was even trusted to shunt the vehicles away at the end of the day, and out in the mornings. These were the days before ramps. All we had was a ramp for oil changes, and one for heavy light commercial vehicles. Other than that we had axle stands. I started there after I left school at easter, and started there in new vehicle preparation on the Tuesday, my first weeks wage was a low £7, but that to me was a lot of money. A short time after that I started my apprenticeship. Like all good things, not long after I passed my exams at Paddington collage, I was sadly made redundant, and not long after that, Keith and Boyle sadly ceased trading and closed its doors for the last time. Hope this information is helpful, and assists in some way. I have very fond memories of my time there which kicked started my times on the spanners.

Paul Barguss

10/02/18 - 06:31

When Blue Belle was taken over, its coaches operated from the United Service Transport coach station in Liberty Street, just a few hundred yards from the Clapham Road Terminal site. In the immediate post war years my parents took me on day trips to the coast, quite often by Blue Bell/United. Initially the vehicles kept their blue livery but were eventually repainted in United's green, although they did retain the Blue Belle name.

Brian Beckett

05/04/18 - 06:52

There's more about "Blue Belle", its relationship with Red & White, and LTCS - including a cut-away plan of the site - here . . . http://richardstransportpages.co.uk/bluebelle.htm

Philip Rushworth

09/04/18 - 07:49

Thx Philip, for adding more information to a fascinating subject. The terminal certainly changed hands plenty of times.

Chris Hebbron

09/04/18 - 07:50

The comment about Blue Belle Coaches and their presence on Acre Land, Brixton (prior to being at the Clapham Road coach station) is intriguing. In fact I was in the present building at 41 Acre Lane on the day of that comment. It would be interesting to know how Blue Belle Coaches used those sites on Acre Lane, and whether the long building behind 57 Acre Lane (presently used as a sound system warehouse) or the other long building just to the east (presently used by a builders' merchants) had anything to do with Blue Belle.

Paul Robson

08/10/19 - 06:05

I came across your photo and post on London's terminal coach station in the late 1920s/1930s. There is a planning application to develop the entire Europcar site stretching back to Palfrey Place, and as an owner at Coachmans Terrace (80-86 Clapham Rd), I wanted to do some research on what the history of the plot is.
The photo and comments on your page are really interesting. I object to the planning application (15/04010/FUL) which is to build 32 residential units towering 4 storeys shadowing Palfrey Place as well as the back of Coachmans Terrace. From history, it sounds like the plot has always been relatively open, welcoming coaches and then a car dealership. It would be a shame to see it filled. By the by, I thought I'd get in touch to say thanks for the enjoyable read.

Olivia

10/10/19 - 05:26

Glad our comments intrigued and interested you, Olivia. The plan you mention sounds ill-suited to the area and I hope the objections you and others make are successful in, at least, modifying the scheme.

Chris Hebbron

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