If you’re near Victoria Coach Station on Friday morning, look out for a heritage fleet of Royal Blue coaches on their annual outing.
The Royal Blue Coaches was a coach operator that existed from 1880 until 1986, with a fleet of, unsurprisingly, blue buses and coaches. There’s a dedicated heritage group that brings together people who own and restore the old Royal Blue coaches, and this weekend is their annual outing.
Royal Blue coach 1433 (HDV 638E), 2012 Bus & Coach Preservation Show
On Friday morning, a fleet of heritage coaches will leave Victoria Coach Station on a run up to Birmingham, so will be quite a sight to watch as they line up in the coach station and then parade out. The fleet is due to arrive at Victoria Coach Station from 9:30am on Friday 17th June and will leave together at 10:30am.
This mass departure of vintage coaches will form one of the spectacles in the year-long VCS90 celebrations marking 90 years since Victoria Coach Station opened. This is also the 21st Royal Blue & Associated Motorways coach run to see preserved coaches retracing original routes they plied when in service.
If you can’t get to Victoria, the route and approximate times are as follows:
| Time | Location and routing |
|---|---|
| 9:30am-10am | London (Victoria Coach Station) (arr) |
| 10:30am | London (Victoria Coach Station) (dep) Embankment, Earls Court to Holland Park A402 to Shepherd’s Bush A4020 (old A40) to Uxbridge A40 to Beaconsfield and High Wycombe |
| Noon | High Wycombe A40 to Stokenchurch A40 to Wheatley |
| 12:50pm | Wheatley (arr) Break |
| 1:40pm | Wheatley (dep) A40 to Oxford |
| 2:00pm | Oxford A4165 out of Oxford A4260 to Kidlington and Banbury |
| 3:00pm | Banbury A422 to Stratford-upon-Avon |
| 3:40pm | Stratford-upon-Avon A3400 (old A34) to Henley-in-Arden |
| 4:15pm | Henley-in-Arden A3400 to Hockley Heath and Bentley Heath A34 through Solihull, Shirley, Hall Green, Sparkhill and Sparkbrook A41/B4100 to Digbeth., Birmingham |
| 5pm | Birmingham (Digbeth) (arr/disperse) |
The event is organised by The Thames Valley & Great Western Omnibus Trust.
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