Cherwell Valley

Cherwell Valley
Moto
28 more photos in the gallery
Road:	M40 at J10 (also accessible to traffic on the A43 and the B430)
Address:	Moto Services Ltd Cherwell Valley Motorway Services Area Northampton Road Ardley Bicester Oxfordshire OX27 7RD
Telephone number:	01869 346060
Signposted from the road?	As Burger King/Costa/M&S
Opened:	1994
Previous operators:	Granada
Grid reference:	SP551282
Services type:	Single site located at a junction.
Visit Cherwell Valley/Moto's official website Facebook Page

Following the major fire a second temporary building has now been erected. The services are now providing most facilities but this is from the temporary building. Keep checking MSA News for further updates.

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Facilities

General: Showers, Wi-Fi
Restaurants: Eat & Drink Co., Burger King, Costa Coffee, Krispy Kreme
Shops: WH Smith, Marks and Spencer Simply Food, Thorntons, Fonebitz
Fuel: Esso with pumps for Unleaded, Ultimate Unleaded, Diesel, Ultimate Diesel and AdBlue.
Motel: none

Parking Prices

First two hours free for all vehicles, after which cars must pay £8 and HGVs £19, or £21 to include a £7.50 food voucher.

Prices can be paid through the phone, with instructions in each car park. They are strictly enforced by CP Plus.

Trivia and Details

Queueing outside the services

Inside the old services

Location

Cherwell Valley is a large service area and it's the first 'proper' one for traffic coming from the South Coast on the A34. Between the opening of the M40 in 1990 and the opening of the services in 1994, it was possible to drive from Dover to Telford (239 motorway miles) without passing any services.

Its biggest flaw is the junction it's on, which was recently remodelled following the upgrade of the A43. The new junction has five single-lane sliproads, four major exits and three tight roundabouts. One of the roundabouts causes a conflict between traffic heading from the M40 north to the A43 and traffic heading from the A43 to the M40 south, causing queues even outside rush hour. Even if you don't need a break when you see signs for the services, you will when you get there.

If the services weren't there, rebuilding the junction would be much easier.

Original Building

The services were one of the first to gain a Marks and Spencers store, which took up four retail units and two 'workspaces'. The store was recently extended along with the Travelodge to keep up with demand. Despite this, Moto tried to claim compensation off the Highways Agency for a loss of traffic due to the roadworks and the new junction layout. Moto lost the case.

The services were considered for six years, and they finally opened on the 31st March 1994 costing £20m and taking up 56 acres of land. Before then there were emergency fuel and toilet facilities located at the junction. Six possible sites were looked at before the services were built.

The original building had an entrance lobby with a coffee shop inside it. This was built in 2000 and originally housed 'Granada 2 Go', an express food store. There was also a plant room built between the motel and the services which was originally a tourist information centre. There were plans to connect this to the main building but they didn't happen.

In 1999, Granada proposed extending the restaurant area to include a formal coffee lounge over the area surrounding the children's play area, with a new, larger play area being built behind the building. The plans would have included a reception, 8 private rooms, 12 personal workstations and a terrace with picnic tables stretching over the area between the services and the motel. There would have also been a "BT Communications Room", which was eventually built as a separate building.

Other abandoned plans included 'family rooms' as part of the toilets area. Much of the front of the services (where Thorntons and M&S were) was an extension, with the entrance originally being next to Little Chef/Costa Coffee. Ladbrokes was originally an amusement arcade.

Fire

On the 15th April at 1pm there was a fire in one of Moto's store rooms which took hold of the roof and eventually destroyed the whole amenity building, narrowly missing the adjacent Travelodge. Around 120 firefighters tackled the blaze which lasted until 5pm and resulted in delays on the M40 and a closure of the A43.

On the 23rd April a new marquee style building opened at the western end of the car park as a temporary measure until better facilities could be set up. These opened on the 15th July at the south-eastern end of the car park and will be used until the permanent building is ready. Only Ladbrokes is not being provided in the temporary building.

Heart Oxfordshire have some photos of the fire.

The building was demolished throughout May.

Replacement

On the 1st July a planning application was put it for the final amenity building. It'll be almost identical to Wetherby, with the same green credentials, only designed to accommodate busier peak periods. All the brands, including Thorntons, which was unique to the services, will be included in the final building.

Instructions for viewing the plans can be found at the forums.

It's presumed that the new building will take a year to build.

Survey Results

In 2006 the services won a five star loo award and were graded 4/5 by Holiday Which?.

Alternatives

Comments and Reviews

Showing the most recent responses only: for the full thread and the ability to edit your own posts, you need to view the topic in the forums.
Author: Message: Elaine I was shocked to see the changes at Cherwell Valley Service Station when I visited on Monday as I had been unaware of the fire. I hope the final new version will still have the green, peaceful area at the back where you can sit and enjoy a drink/food sitting underneath the trees. It helps to relax in the middle of a long motorway drive. Posted: 24 Aug 2010, 21:28 Anonymous Can anyone tell me if the travelodge has re-opened or will be open soon or is it opening/open under another name? Thanks. Posted: 19 Aug 2010, 22:12 Johnny Visited the temporary facilities at 2pm on the 8th August. The building was very busy when I was there but the car park still had some spaces, so I'm guessing this is a place to avoid at peak times. If it wasn't for that, I'd be suggesting that they made the current setup permanent: it's a suitable and much-improved replacement of the old site. It seemed to be pretty well-maintained too, even if it was only a few weeks old. The only loss here is the lack of green space, which Cherwell Valley used to offer a lot of. I noticed some people had improvised and crossed the road in order to picnic by the petrol station. Posted: 19 Aug 2010, 20:55 Kelly We called in at the Cherwell Valley services, Saturday July 24th ...didn't fancy Burgher King which had long queues. The staff at EDC were ,at best, indolent. The food was cold and expensive...we asked for the manager who wasn't "available". We left most of it and picked up a sandwich each at M&S...All in all and expesive and annoying experience...SHOULD'VE GONE TO BURGHER KING!!! Posted: 25 Jul 2010, 21:22 Eddy McDowall When Cherwell Valley Services is re-built it will have a Changing Places  : see http://www.changing-places.org for more information. Posted: 22 Jul 2010, 15:46 P. Ainsworth The Travel Lodge was affected by the fire & is still closed because they have no water supply! We were only notified by email on Thursday at 17.11, which I didn't pick up until Friday morning. We were offered alternative accommodation at a Travel Lodge in the area but warned they were filling up fast. As we are leaving today, we were a bit concerned but have got a place at Pear Tree, so that's fine. Posted: 24 Apr 2010, 10:07 Anonymous I visit here on my commuter from London to Birmingham every Monday....but no more as it has just burnt to the ground! Posted: 15 Apr 2010, 16:00 Johnny Visited at 1:30pm on Good Friday. As expected traffic was queueing across the junction which adds a few minutes to the visit. Finding a parking space wasn't easy either (the most spaces are outside the Travelodge, the first left as you enter) and inside the main corridor was incredibly cramped. The actual facilities were fine, but it was very busy. Thorntons still seems to be going strong which is good to see, Fonebitz and M&S now replace Scoop and T2. The amount of open space around the back is fantastic, if you remember to look for it, just make sure you don't slip on the wooden bridge! Posted: 11 Apr 2010, 15:01 chris stoped here on my way back from uni, the food and the service was terriable, and which bright spark decided a ladbrokes was needed at a service station? i also lost my wallet, so all in all i throughley enjoyed my visit!! Posted: 21 Dec 2009, 02:14 Grahame Stopped on the way to Bicester, No one in front of us to be served, there were no plates available, when they arrived they were stone cold, meal was thrown on them not placed staff very ignorant and unhelpful. Coffee machine not working, assistant did not help. Whole complex very cold everyone complaining and loud music rang out not suitable for a relaxing break. Will not stop there again. Posted: 08 Dec 2009, 21:42
Showing the most recent responses only: for the full thread and the ability to edit your own posts, you need to view the topic in the forums.

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With thanks to the user 'MatthewB6323' for the information used on this page.