Fleet and van washing across West London and Heathrow

Four corridors

Where the west's vans sleep

The M4 corridor: Slough, Southall, the Bath Road

The Slough Trading Estate is the largest industrial estate in single ownership in Europe, 400 businesses and 17,000 jobs at the junction of the M4, the M40 and the M25, and its vans cross three motorways for a living. Southall's depots sit between the Grand Union Canal and the motorway with the approach overhead; the Bath Road's courier compounds and hotel shuttle fleets at Hounslow and Feltham sit directly under it. The oily film lands weekly on all of them, so the fortnightly outside wash is a year round habit on this corridor, and the shuttles get the Essential Inside & Out weekly because the guests sit in them. Slough's town centre is a demolition site from this year, and vans parked near the Queensmere works want the Deluxe Exterior for the cement in the arches.

The A40: Park Royal, Greenford, Northolt

Park Royal's sheds, Greenford's depots along the Greenford Road and Northolt's yards off the Western Avenue are the delivery end of west London, and the Western Avenue's iron and tar are what they wear. Essential Exterior fortnightly through the winter, Deluxe Exterior monthly for the arches.

The Metropolitan line: Harrow, Ealing and the sole traders

The plumber in Hanwell and the electrician in Harrow park the van on the drive, and that is where it gets washed: the driver books it like any other wash, the business pays, and the photographs go to the phone that booked. The ULEZ covers every one of these boroughs at £12.50 a day for a non compliant vehicle, and a van washed on its own drive has not crossed anything.

The river: Staines and the M25

Spelthorne's distribution yards sit between the M25, the M3 and the Thames, and their vans take motorway spray and river damp in turn. Essential Exterior fortnightly through the salt months, when Staines Road is among the first roads gritted.

Booking a fleet

How a West London fleet gets booked

It starts with the yard's postcode, which the booking page runs against the Network's coverage before anything else. Then the vans go on, one line each, small, medium, large or minibus, and the price for each size sits beside it before any card is touched; a long wheelbase Sprinter is not priced like a Caddy, and nobody finds that out afterwards. One window, one payment, and the office has a receipt that lists every registration, which is the document the bookkeeper actually wants. On the morning the washer's van arrives with its own water tank and generator, so a compound with no services is no obstacle, and every vehicle is photographed before the wash and after it; the wash report is what gets produced when a driver says the dent was already there.

On the M4 corridor the outside wash is every two weeks in every month of the year, because the airport's film does not stop for the summer. On the A40, in Harrow and by the river it is monthly from April to October and every two weeks from mid November, when Hounslow's six gritters and the other boroughs' crews are salting the main roads. The cabs are added on alternate visits, or weekly for anything the public sits in. Since the clocks went back on 25 October the 10am window has the whole yard finished before the afternoon runs go out; a single van is simply booked like any other wash, and a standing plan across more than one yard is set out on the fleet page.

Fleets we wash across the west

• Twelve courier vans on the Slough Trading Estate: Essential Exterior every two weeks all year, cabs on alternate visits, finished by lunchtime.
• A Park Royal builders' merchant: Essential Exterior through the winter, Deluxe Exterior once a month for the arches and sills.
• Three traders' vans behind a Southall shop: Essential Exterior in the business's own spaces, early, before the Broadway wakes up.
• Eight hotel shuttles on the Bath Road: Essential Inside & Out every week, because the guests sit in them.
• A Staines distribution yard between the M25 and the river: Essential Exterior every two weeks from mid November to March.
• One electrician's van on a Hanwell drive: booked by the driver, paid by the business, photographs to the driver's phone.

More on this: fleet cleaning plans and fleet washing in Hillingdon and the airport's freight yards.