Motorway Services Online

As a society, we are grateful for the support all of the main operators have offered us as we go about our hobby. We ask that you return the same respect by abiding by the following instructions whenever you visit a service area to take photos or look at the history.

• Follow any instructions given by staff, contractors or emergency services.
• Most staff will be surprised to hear their workplace is your hobby. Be polite if they are curious - they may even be able to help you.
• People should not be made to feel uncomfortable in their own workplace. Be careful when taking pictures with staff in them. Neither staff nor customers may understand that you're only interested in the building!
• If you want to cross a road, use common sense. Traffic entering the service area can be busy and will not be expecting pedestrians.
  • Avoid standing with your back to traffic.
• Never try to enter a room which is clearly not intended for public access without permission. We don't endorse trespassing of any kind.
• Do not walk past the start/end of motorway signs or cross the motorway fence; it is illegal.
• We are not interested in photos of things such the back of a cash machine or a security system. Be wary that taking photos near things like this may make you look nefarious.
• If you are taking pictures for professional reasons, you must inform the operator first. If you look like you're a professional (you might be using a DSLR or taking a long time), it is only fair that you do the same.
• If you are in a small café, it is good manners to make a purchase when you visit.

It doesn't matter whether you're taking photos with the intention of uploading them to this website or not: by carrying out your hobby you are representing all enthusiasts. We ask you to be polite and considerate at all times.

It should go without saying, but just in case: artificially generated images are not permitted. We have plenty of real ones.

What happens to my photos?

When you upload a photo to Motorway Services Online, it will appear in the following places:

• The photo will have its own page on the website, where your name or username will be thanked.
• The photo will appear in any of our picture galleries which it has been added to.
• The photo may be used to illustrate one of our content pages.
• Each page on our website has one image which is selected as an "Open Graph" image. Basically when someone shares a link to this website and a little illustration appears alongside it, we are saying that your picture could be that illustration.
• We may share your photos on our social media channels, with credit applied. At present, our social media channels are Facebook, Twitter (X), Mastodon and Bluesky, though it's rare that we directly upload other people's images.

Any metadata that you upload with your image will be retained on the server and may appear in any subsequent reuses. You maintain full copyright over your images, and are welcome to use them elsewhere as you wish. However, by sharing an image with us, you grant us permission to use it as explained above. If you later decide to revoke that permission, you are entitled to edit the photo page to say so, or simply contact us and we will arrange this. Please note that large requests may take some time to action.

Occasionally other websites, books or TV shows see our images and ask if they can use them. We tell them to contact us, and we will forward their query on to you, allowing you to decide whether you wish to engage with them or not. We don't pass on your contact details. While we do our best to stick up for our contributors who may be worried about copyright, ultimately we can't take responsibility for what happens to images once they have been published online.

On very rare occasions a third party may contact us to request that your photo is removed. As a matter of good ethics, we will consider each request, and will inform you of our decision.

If you have any queries or concerns, please get in touch. The page Help:Photos should help answer some basic questions about uploading and adding photos.