LEICESTER’S new and improved St Margaret’s Bus Station will be open to passengers from next week, but visitors can enjoy an early look around this Sunday (26 Jun).
Around 20 local bus services – which have been operating from temporary stops throughout the 18 months of construction – will return to the new building from Monday 27 June.
The services due to return to the new bus station affected are as follows:
- Kinchbus service 2 to Loughborough – Bay SF
- Arriva 26, 26A and 27 to Coalville – Bay SJ
- Arriva 29, 29A, 29B and X29 to Swadlincote – Bay SK
- Arriva 84 to Lutterworth – Bay SQ
- Arriva 85 to Blaby and South Wigston – Bay SR
- Arriva 126 and 127 to Coalville or Shepshed – Bay SH
- Roberts Coaches 125 to Castle Donnington – Bay SL
- Arriva 152 and 153 to Market Bosworth – Bay SM
- Centrebus 154 to Loughborough – Bay SE
- Kinchbus Skylink – Bay SG
- Arriva X6 to Coventry – Bay SU
- Arriva X45 to Magna Park – Bay SZ
- Arriva X84 to Rugby – Bay SP
- British Gas Transport – Bay SZ
- Flixbus, New Bharat Coaches and Thandi Coaches – Bays SC &SD
National Express are due to return to the new building from Tuesday 5 July.
Visitors will have an opportunity to have a look around the new St Margaret’s Bus Station as part of a formal opening of the building on Sunday 26 June, from 12.30pm. During the open afternoon, Leicester Transport Heritage Trust will be inviting visitors to explore the history of bus travel with a display of vintage vehicles. There will also be a chance to take a trip back in time with a free vintage bus service between the new St Margaret’s Bus Station and Abbey Pumping Station. The event runs until 4pm.
The new landmark building creates a striking gateway into the centre of the city. It features a glazed concourse to maximise natural lighting and cut energy consumption and a curved aluminium roof where a solar array of 390 photovoltaic panels will generate more clean, green power than is needed to run the building.
The building has an Energy Performance Certificate (EPC) with the highest possible rating of A+ and a score of -4. This means that the new bus station building will be better than net zero carbon in terms of its operational emissions.
Bus passengers will benefit from a completely redesigned, improved and more spacious internal layout with better seating, a new café, modern toilets complete with a Changing Places accessible facility, and real-time digital passenger information. The new building also provides significantly more capacity for national and regional services, with the number of available bays increased by a third from 18 to 24.
Electric bus charging points have been installed and the new building will offer secure storage for up to 100 bicycles, as well being the latest location for a docking station as part of the city’s new e-bike share scheme, Santander Cycles Leicester.
Improvements to footpaths and roads next to the bus station are also complete. These include new and improved facilities for cyclists and pedestrians, safer crossings, new landscaping and more tree planting. The work will help strengthen and improve links between key development sites and the city centre, including the new Savoy Street which will provide a quick, direct pedestrian route link between St Margaret’s and Haymarket bus stations.
Deputy city mayor Cllr Adam Clarke, who leads on environment and transportation, said: “The new St Margaret’s Bus Station represents an ambitious and important step forwards in our efforts to become a carbon neutral city. We believe that this is the first net zero carbon bus station building in the UK.
“It shows our commitment to decarbonising our public buildings and will build on our work to promote sustainable transport and help improve services for bus passengers in and around the city, through our new Leicester Buses Partnership with local operators.”
The bus station redevelopment is part of the £14.3million St Margaret’s Gateway regeneration project. This has been supported by a £10.5million allocation from the Getting Building Fund, a pot of government money awarded to the Leicester and Leicestershire Enterprise Partnership (LLEP) for shovel-ready infrastructure projects to help create jobs and support economic recovery across the country.