Park Royal Vehicles was one of Britain's leading

coachbuilder A coachbuilder or body-maker is someone who manufactures bodies for passenger-carrying vehicles.Construction has always been a skilled trade requiring a relatively lightweight product with sufficient strength. The manufacture of necessarily ...

s and

bus manufacturers A bus (contracted from omnibus, with variants multibus, motorbus, autobus, etc.) is a road vehicle that carries significantly more passengers than an average car or van. It is most commonly used in public transport, but is also in use for ...

, based at

Park Royal Park Royal is an area in North West London, North West London, England, partly in the London Borough of Brent and partly the London Borough of Ealing. It is the site of the largest business park in London, but despite intensive existing use, ...

, Abbey Road, in west

London London is the capital and List of urban areas in the United Kingdom, largest city of England and the United Kingdom, with a population of just under 9 million. It stands on the River Thames in south-east England at the head of a estuary dow ...

. With origins dating back to 1889, the company also had a

Leeds Leeds () is a City status in the United Kingdom, city and the administrative centre of the City of Leeds district in West Yorkshire, England. It is built around the River Aire and is in the eastern foothills of the Pennines. It is also the thi ...

-based subsidiary, Charles H. Roe. Labour problems and slowness of production led to its closure in 1980.Ron Phillips. ''A History of the Leyland Bus'', Crowood Press, Ramsbury 2015.

Associated Commercial Vehicles

Associated with AEC from the 1930s in 1949 it became part of Associated Commercial Vehicles Ltd., which included AEC (the chassis manufacturer). This formidable combination of AEC and PRV supported the demanding requirements of London Transport and many other major fleet owners and operators. The famous

AEC Routemaster The AEC Routemaster is a front-engined double-decker bus that was designed by London Transport and built by the Associated Equipment Company (AEC) and Park Royal Vehicles. The first prototype was completed in September 1954 and the last one ...

bus was built at Park Royal.

Leyland Motors

In 1962 the ACV Group merged with the

Leyland Motors Leyland Motors Limited (later known as the Leyland Motor Corporation) was a British vehicle manufacturer of lorries, buses and trolleybuses. The company diversified into car manufacturing with its acquisitions of Triumph and Rover in 1960 an ...

group to form Leyland Motor Corporation. In 1968 Leyland Motor Corporation and British Motor Holdings merged, becoming

British Leyland Motor Corporation British Leyland was an automotive engineering and manufacturing conglomerate formed in the United Kingdom in 1968 as British Leyland Motor Corporation Ltd (BLMC), following the merger of Leyland Motors and British Motor Holdings. It was partly ...

. BL (British Leyland) was nationalised by the Labour Government in 1975, following which many subsidiaries were closed, including AEC in 1979 and Park Royal in July 1980.

Other vehicles

Park Royal was also responsible for many other coachworks besides London buses. It had a vast array of vehicles to its name including the first diesel London Taxi, a number of railcars and railbuses (e.g. the British Rail Class 103 and one of the British Rail Railbuses) and

World War II World War II or the Second World War, often abbreviated as WWII or WW2, was a world war that lasted from 1939 to 1945. It involved the World War II by country, vast majority of the world's countries—including all of the great power ...

vehicles. During World War II it also played a part in the production of Halifax bombers as the outer wings and engine cowlings were built at the Park Royal site. Park Royal built 150 Green Goddesses during the period November 1954 to January 1955 with PRV body numbers B37444 - B37593 and registrations PGW51 - PGW200.

References

External links

Site dedicated to Park Royal Vehicles

{{Authority control Defunct bus manufacturers of the United Kingdom Vehicle manufacture in London Associated Equipment Company Companies based in the London Borough of Brent History of the London Borough of Brent Park Royal