Customer seating area at Warwick Southbound, located left of the main entrance alongside all of the fast food outlets. Many brands have to share this seating, so large amounts of it are available. I took a pic of the section of seating under the large glass frontage, which appears very bright, but busy. The location of the seating has remained the same since 1995 when Warwick opened, however, its purpose is different now. When Warwick South opened, the food court offer was a large Granary restaurant, KFC and Burger King. Since, the Granary was replaced by Food Connection, which was rebranded Eat In, which then closed & Welcome Break opened several smaller units, building a mini food-court with this seating serving several units, as opposed to a single restaurant. The interior of Warwick South was fully renovated in 2014, breathing life back into this amenity building which hadn’t changed much since opening. Both Warwick’s are well organised & always seem tidy. Despite how busy it was, there wasn’t any litter left on the tables & chairs and the place is looked after well. This seating is pushed to the far left of the building so customers don’t have to walk through seating to access the fast food units. Both sides of Warwick are now the oldest motorway services buildings on the M40, & this can be evidenced with their slightly smaller size. Beaconsfield, Oxford and Cherwell Valley all obtain a more modern design with high ceilings, open seating areas and food/shops surrounding. This seating area also includes a Welcome Break news TV. Most Welcome Break’s have these & they largely provide traffic updates and news about their sites. The interior of Warwick South is similar to Birchanger Green on the M11, which is another 1990s Welcome Break building. Warwick South, although popular, is much more relaxed than any other M40 site as it’s only serving Southbound customers. Customer seating was in high demand during my visit due to the large influx of customers as a result of two large coaches stopping. Some customers couldn’t get seated. Without the coaches, seating would be more plentiful, especially in the mornings when many customers use Starbucks, which has its own seating.

Photo taken on 24/06/2024 by Tom Moon.

Assigned to galleries: Warwick, Welcome Break, M40