Overview

Norwich Bus Station is located in the south east of central Norwich. It’s a location where a large number of buses and coaches stop and pick up passengers. You can get to it via Queens Road or Surrey Street. The site was on a bit of a hill with Surrey Street being lower down than Queens Road. It’s just worth noting that certain parts of the walkways do have a lot of incline and I struggled to push myself up some sections. There are approximately 14 bus stops in total although some didn’t appear to be actively used. All the stops had information displays saying which bus or coach would be arriving at that stop next and when. Within each bus stop there was a small amount of covered seating. The main part of the station has a covered waiting area. Inside there was an information desk, with a lowered counter, a small cafe, toilets, and a selection of seating. The seating varied between banks of seats in the main section and some higher bar height seating around the edge of the area. The doors of this area were propped open when I visited as it was warm and sunny. In colder weather it seems that the doors would be operated by buttons located inside and out. There was an accessible toilet here which was slightly small but was still really helpful. While it didn’t feel too busy while I was there, it was slightly cramped in the main part of the station. If you were travelling with luggage and mobility equipment it might be hard to navigate between the seating sections.

Transport & Parking

Norwich Train Station was 1.4km away from the bus station, about a 20-minute walk. Although the roads between can be very hilly so if you were using a manual wheelchair (like I was!) it could take longer depending on the steepness of the inclines. There wasn’t any parking available here. The best way to travel to this location is walking or by bus.

Access

All of the routes into the bus station followed on from the surrounding streets so there was step-free access at each point. The points where each bus would be stopping were marked clearly with lettered bus shelters. These bus shelters had a small amount of seating under a canopy and an information display. There were different heights of seating available in the main part of the station and it was a decent amount of seating. The entrance to the main part had automatic doors, controlled by a button, although these were left open in good weather. The information point had a lowered counter although there was also retractable belt barriers creating a queue system which was quite narrow. I asked if there was a hearing loop in operation at the station and they advised me that there wasn’t. I didn’t see any other alternative formats for any information.

Toilets

The accessible toilet was located to the left of the information desk and was signposted as “Inclusive Toilet”. The door opened outwards and had a simple door handle which twisted to lock the door from the inside. There was also a horizontal grab rail on the inside of the door to assist with closing it. Inside it was a fairly small space, there was limited space for a left-side transfer but the bins did make this harder. The toilet had a vertical grab rail mounted on the wall behind it and a horizontal grab rail mounted on the other side. A grab rail that could be raised and lowered as needed was also mounted on the wall behind the toilet. The sink had a tap that was manually operated (no automatic sensors) and a soap dispenser that needed to be pushed to dispense. There were two more vertical grab rails mounted on either side of the sink. A small mirror was mounted above the sink but, it was too high for me to see anything in. The hand dryer was mounted on the wall to the right of the sink and was automatically operated. On the wall opposite the sink were baby-changing facilities and another, larger mirror. The emergency cord was hanging freely, to the floor.

Staff

There were a number of members of staff around the information desk and they were all very helpful, although I didn’t interact with them that much.

Photos