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Preston Bus Station Tithebarn Street, Preston, Lancashire As a result of its location, Preston has played the role of an important transport hub since before the motorway network was built. The need to ease traffic in the town resulted in the Preston by-pass, Britain's first motorway, which opened in 1958. The density of traffic also necessitated a road traffic terminus capable of handling the large volumes of buses and coaches that passed through the town. In 1966, after an initial commission in 1959 for a combined car park and bus station proved inadequate for the rapidly increasing road traffic volumes, Preston Corporation handed the scheme to Keith Ingham and Charles Wilson of Building Design Partnership. The consulting structural engineers were Ove Arup and Partners, with E H Stazicker acting as the borough engineer and surveyor. The resulting bus station and car-park, built in 1968 and 1969, had car park accommodation for 1,100 car spaces, with the bus station below capable of holding eighty double decker buses. The structure is made of reinforced and precast concrete. The bus station is housed in a tall ground floor with mezzanine, and above are four and five floors of car parking. The side facades are clad in white tiles, have glazed ground floors with dramatic curved, concrete fronts to upper car park floors. Below is a glazed curtain wall in narrow vertical panels. Metal and wood barriers separate platforms. The interior of the bus station has white tile wall cladding, and black rubber tiled floor. The doors, barrier rails and seats are of oiled iroko wood. Internal upper floors have office accommodation for bus companies. The curved form of the car park floor edge serves to reduce loadings and evolved after acceptable finishes to a vertical wall proved too expensive. This curve contributes to the organic, sculptural nature of the building. The edges are functional, too, in that they protect car bumpers from crashing against a vertical wall. The cover balustrade protects passengers from the weather by allowing buses to penetrate beneath the lower parking floor. Ingham designed the street furniture and a signing system with alphabetical briefing signs in the subway approaches, confirmatory departure gate lists and clear gate labels. Preston Bus station is far from perfect. Pedestrians trying to reach the terminal building are faced with the choice of using a subway or crossing the busy apron area. The Bus Station is at the opposite side of the town centre to the busy railway station - hardly an integrated transport system. But these problems are not insurmountable. When Preston's local paper conducted a poll the majority of those asked wanted to keep the Bus Station. The reason that Preston Bus Station is well liked is because it works. Passengers like it for its ease of use and weather protected waiting areas. Bus drivers like it for its safe and functional design and car drivers like it for it ample and logical parking. In 1998 Preston Borough Council held a "Town Centre Initiative" conference at which it was agreed that the town needed to reposition itself in the regional shopping hierarchy in order to halt long-term decline, to secure prosperity and to improve the urban environment. In 2000 Grosvenor Estates, along with Preston Borough Council, commissioned the production of an analytical study of Preston Town Centre. When it became clear that part of the redevelopment included the replacing of Preston Bus Station with a retail complex, strong local opposition led to an application for listing. Preston Borough Council strongly opposed the application and listing was subsequently rejected. The pressure to redevelop the area is strong and the listing refusal puts this stunning example of 1960's coordinated transport planning firmly at risk. Eddy Rhead
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