bk World opens largest driver lounge at ElectroWay hub in Magna Park

bk World has opened its largest lounge to date at ElectroWay’s new eHGV charging hub at Magna Park Lutterworth, with eleven cubes offering unmanned, round-the-clock welfare facilities for truck drivers.

bk World and its client ElectroWay have opened a driver lounge made of eleven cubes at Magna Park Lutterworth in Leicestershire. The facility is the centre of ElectroWay’s new charging hub for electric heavy goods vehicles and is open around the clock to every driver on site. It is bk World’s first location with ElectroWay and its second in the UK, after Newcastle.

According to bk World, the site took nine months to complete. Magna Park is Europe’s largest logistics and distribution park. It sits in the “Golden Triangle” between the M1, M6 and M69 motorways, and around 85 percent of the UK population can be reached from it within four and a half hours by truck. Many companies on the park have set net-zero targets, which creates demand for electric freight on site.

ElectroWay’s hub combines solar power, battery storage, 32 DC charging bays rated at 150 to 400 kW and 180 secured truck bays in one system. This lets drivers combine the charging stop with their mandatory rest break.

The lounge runs unmanned, which bk World says gives drivers a high-quality stay at the lowest possible cost for the operator. A robotic system, which the company describes as unique worldwide, hands out snacks, drinks, groceries and toiletries. Hot meals are heated automatically in Panasonic microwaves that recognise each dish by its QR code. Coffee, seating and two Nintendo Switch consoles complete the welfare building.

A separate washroom building for drivers on multi-day tours has eleven showers, seven toilets, two washing machines and a dryer. Every guest gets access through a voucher system that bk World says is the only one of its kind worldwide.

More than 250 guests from OEMs, logistics, energy and charge point operators attended the opening event, where electric trucks charged at 400 kW outside the lounge. Bosch Road Services and Keoma Energy were among the partners involved in the project.