We had a recent review on Google from a customer who visited the pub. They said that it was a shame that we didn’t have a car park, but there was street parking nearby.

The trouble with some reviews is that they may not actually be correct, and we have no way to change the review. We did respond to the customer to let them know that we do have a car park.

The Victoria Tavern car park up to 2020

Access to the pub used to be possible from both Smarts Lane and Forest Road. You could drive into the car park from either road.

As time passed some people would use this dual access as a cut-through from one road to the other.

Customers had to pass from the pub to the garden via this small access road. This caused a number of safety issues with cars using the road as a cut-through as they travelled significantly faster than cars simply parking.

A decision was made to close the access to the car park from Forest Road. This way, the number of cars that could park in the car park was increased and it could not be used as a cut-through. This system worked perfectly until 2020 when COVID-19 appeared in the UK.

The Victoria Tavern car park 2020 to date

After Lock-down 2020 and pubs were allowed to re-open, we decided to create a new and larger outside area.

We took down the fences between the garden and the car park access road. We erected a large awning and seating area so that more people could use the garden, even if the weather was not perfect. We also opened up the Forest Road access and closed the Smarts Lane access to the car park. This way, cars no longer passed the front of the pub. Cars could no longer access the car park from Smarts Lane.

So, If you are not local (probably like our recent Google reviewer) and you use your sat-nav to get to the Victoria Tavern, bear this in mind, our Address is 165 Smarts Lane, but access to the carpark is from Forest Road.