Ryton was built during the war under the government's shadow factory scheme. It provided Rootes with a second plant to boost armaments production. After the war it became the primary Rootes car plant. It was used for production of the Minx and its variants (1945-1969), Super Minx (1961-1967), Hunter (1966-1969), Avenger (1970-1976), Humbers (1945-1969), Gazelle and Vogue (1956-1969), Sunbeam-Talbots (1945-1957), Rapier (1955-1969), Alpine (1962-1969), and more recently Talbot Alpine/Solara/Horizon, and Peugeot 309, 405, 306 and 206. Car production ended in 2007.
My photographs here are a bit disappointing. The plant is surrounded by trees and I found it hard to get any decent photos from ground level. In the end I had to settle for the plant entrance. I wasn't allowed in here, despite the "Welcome" sign. The visitors car park is not very interesting at all.
At the time, the plant was still in use for car production and I got the impression they did't want prying eyes watching what went on.
The plant is at the junction of the A45 (London Road) and A423 (Oxford Road). In the A-Z Street Atlas of Coventry, the plant is on Map 22, C7.
If you have Google Earth, you can see recent satellite images of the Ryton site by opening this .kmz placemark file:
The following photos were taken on 26 April 1998.
Ryton in 1982. On the left hand edge of the photograph, about two thirds of the way up, you can see the junction of Oxford and London Roads. It was from here that my photographs were taken. Coventry can be seen in the background. From Graham Robson's Cars of the Rootes Group.