Inside Croydon is feeling flushed with success.

The Bog in the Box is no more, much to the relief of residents of Court Wood Lane, if not the drivers of 353 buses.

Earlier this month, Inside Croydon brought you the news of the eye-sore, plonked down by Transport for London in the middle of a residential area, just a few feet from the Selsdon nature reserve.

The port-a-loo was placed there for drivers on the 353 route who need to answer a call of nature, even though they are barely a five-minute drive from proper facilities at the Addington interchange.

But after a meeting with local councillor Margaret Mead and residents last Thursday expressed their concerns to officials from TfL, first the green cladding and today the lavatory itself have been removed.

The inconvenient convenience had been installed by TfL when they adjusted local bus routes, even though residents maintain that most journeys they make are to the tram junction at Addington, where bus crews can be changed or staff use the proper facilities there.

Around 20 concerned residents had attended the meeting. A suggestion that they should make an attempt to be included in the Guinness Book of Records by seeing how many could fit inside the unloved Bog in the Box was rejected, as being too much like toilet humour.

But one passing bus driver even leaned out of his cab window and told the meeting, “I wouldn’t want that outside my house, either.”

The meeting was also attended by Steve “Three Jobs” O’Connell, who despite being Croydon and Sutton’s London Assembly Member, and therefore supposedly in touch with what City Hall is planning in the area, had failed to prevent the waste of public money that saw the loo installed in the first place.

TfL officials, on viewing the Selsdon Bog in the Box last week, admitted that it was poorly positioned for the exit from the nature reserve’s car park, and they also agreed that they would ensure that the grass verge on which it had been sited, and which had been damaged in the process, would be made good.

Heathfield councillor Margaret Mead told Inside Croydon: “This is very good news for the residents and the best Christmas present for them.”

Though some might suggest that as prezzies go, this one’s a bit, well… bog-standard.

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