One of the delights of landing at Heathrow is easy access to central London for an afternoon of exploring before an onward evening flight - but the left luggage facility at Victoria Station last year charged 5.50 pounds per piece, compared to the former charge of 3.00 pounds per locker.

Can someone suggest an alternative to this now very expensive charge - e.g. hotels, or colleges or ??? within a few minutes walk of a central London tube station?

Thanks,

- dgap

Most hotels will hold luggage - IF you are staying there. Very few would store luggage for someone just walking in off the street. But you might get away w/ it.

The left luggage facilities at all the mainline stations will charge about the same as at the airport - so I'd just leave the stuff at LHR and travel into town "luggage-less"

The suggestion from Janis sounds very sensible - I have never had to leave luggage behind coming INTO central London as it has always been checked through to my final destination. I have however left luggage at Paddington station when checking out of a hotel and then collecting it before boarding the Heathrow Express. You could do this in reverse.

Thank you janis and tod - but surely there must be a less costly solution to this question - how have other visitors or commuters got around this hefty GBP 5.50 per piece charge?

BTW, this kind of excessive charging is hardly the kind of welcome which will encourage visitors to spend a few hours in Central London - either upon arrival or departure where a Central London stop may be made enroute to or from a provincial destination - compare this to the welcome the Dutch make for travellers who transit Schiphold (sp?) Airport in Holland with a few hours between flights to visit central Amsterdam and Rotterdam - are you listening British Tourist Authority?

I agree that the charge is outrageous. These left luggage offices are run by a company called Excess Baggage (www.excess-baggage.com), but I don't know of anywhere else. In many other UK cities, the stations have no left luggage service: I spent a few hours in Cardiff last year, and the only place to leave luggage is the tourist office which closes in the late afternoon.

dgap: Since most people either will have checked their luggage through to their final destination, or are staying in London overnight - my guess is not that many people are inconvienced. You'll probably only have one carry on (perperson) to store - £5.50 may seem expensive but would be worth it to me for the convenience.

It's been a long time since lockers were available most anywhere in the UK (It still surprises me when I do see lockers in a few London museums). They have had long success in thwarting terrorist attacks so I would not knock the lack of lockers.

They have luggage lockers at railway stations all over Germany, and their stations don't get bombed any more than British ones. The idea that closing luggage lockers stops terrorism is absurd. If terrorists really want to attack London, they won't give up simply because there are no left luggage lockers. I don't think there have ever been any terrorist attacks on luggage lockers, whereas people have been killed by car bombs. If there were an immediate terrorist threat, it would be necessary to ban cars from the streets of London, but even that wouldn't stop suicide bombers. Closing left luggage lockers is a petty measure that gives the impression that the authorities are "doing something" about terrorism, but causes great inconvenience to some travellers. The limited left luggage offices at London stations are outrageously overpriced, and give visitors a very poor impression of the UK if they've used left luggage facilities elsewhere in Europe.

janis: which museums have the lockers you mentioned? thanks,

- dgap

I am afraid that you have to pay the fee-I researched this and haven`t found a cheaper way then to do it at the train stations. I can not think of a museum who do it for free with luggage-not a small bag you bring from a shop and want to store for a short time. Most museums state that they do not even store big trolleys or umbrellas!

There are lockers at the V&A and also at the British Library but in neither case are they large enough to accommodate luggage.

There's a less expensive left luggage service at Victoria Coach (bus) station:

Info:

http://www.tfl.gov.uk/vcs/facilities_luggage.shtml

Hope this helps.

Dave White
dw@OnOurOwnIn London.com