Woosh 'Park & Ride' Nine years ago

[TimBrown]

Memories of what we had nine years ago. Seven years of successful operation by First Midland Red then it was taken over by Worcestershire County Council in 2008 as Woosh and subsequently closed down on 1 September 2014 because it allegedly cost too much to run. Since then, car parking charges at a multitude of sites have been reduced in Worcester City to 'protect shops and businesses' from competition of the lower rental retail outlets at Blackpole, Tybridge Street, St Peters, St Martin's Gate, Shrub Hill Retail Park and Lowesmoor Trading estates (to name a few).

Sadly there is no chance of a 'park and ride' revival as a commercial venture because of the above factors, so the purpose-built Perdiswell site lies mothballed gathering weeds and mould as a monument to inept marketing and lack of political vision whilst the City becomes increasingly clogged up with more and more cars.

The first two two interior shots are of the Mercedes Citaro and the third picture is taken inside Optare Versa when brand new.

06 May 2008 Foregate IMG_0627.JPG

08 May 2008 Perdiswell IMG_0629.JPG

09 May 2008 Perdiswell IMG_0640.JPG

09 May 2008 Perdiswell IMG_0641.JPG

09 May 2008 Crowngate IMG_0638.JPG

09 May 2008 Crowngate IMG_0639.JPG

10 May 2008 Perdiswell IMG_0647.JPG

10 May 2008 Crowngate IMG_0649.JPG

10 May 2008 Perdiswell IMG_0646.JPG

10 May 2008 Perdiswell IMG_0645.JPG

[AdamH]

Nine years already How time flys!

[chason]

A super set of shots. Can't believe this was all 9 years ago and who would have thought then that it would all have been abandoned so soon. I still find it hard to understand why Park and Ride couldn't be made to work in Worcester when apparently it's been a success for many years in similar cities like Bath, Oxford and York and still apparently going strong.

[AdamH]

It will never work while we have a local authority that strongly favours car users over public transport. At the time it closed First looked at taking it back on as a commercial venture, but the local authority that owns the site wanted more in rent than we currently pay for Crowngate Bus Station, making it totally unviable.

[MattW]

That old 'lack of political will' thing!