When Sellar unveiled plans to radically redevelop Liverpool Street Station and the grade II-listed Great Eastern Hotel in 2016 heritage groups quickly mobilised. The plans, which call for a 15-storey office tower cantilevered over the stations and hotel ignore the historic setting and are massively overscaled.
The Twentieth Century Society has joined with other heritage organisations to form LISSCA to protect the special Victorian elements of the buildings.
Resilience
A central London rail station made famous in Monopoly is undergoing a multi-million pound transformation, making it a more sustainable hub. The scheme will see vital capacity upgrades, and a new public space for people to gather and interact with each other. It also provides the opportunity to showcase the station’s unique heritage features.
In the retail climate around stations where passenger numbers were hardest hit, the highest survival rates are in entertainment (88%) and the lowest for fashion & general clothing (56%). This last sector was significantly impacted by reduced demand for mens’ suits from remote working. In a more positive trend, we have found that restaurants and cafés near transport hubs are experiencing a strong recovery in their vacancy rates as the hospitality sector reopens.
The new spaces at Liverpool Street Station are designed to embrace the future. They have been designed with the ability to be reconfigured as the future of mobility and travel changes. For example, when the MEP systems were originally designed in 2007, it was impossible to imagine that we would be streaming data on our mobile phones and paying with contactless payment technology.
This is a crucial aspect of resilient design. It is important to understand how the organisational capabilities that influence asset resilience are interrelated and develop a management framework that enables them to be continually improved.
Connectivity
The great railway stations of London – cathedrals of steel and glass refracting the ever-changing patterns of northern light – are among the world’s iconic architectural structures. St Pancras, Paddington and Waterloo are universally beloved for their vaulted roofs. But by the 1970s Liverpool Street was a dank, disused, underused relic of another age.
A pioneering renovation between 1985 and 1992 saw the station’s Victorian pillars, cast iron facade and a memorial to railway workers who died in the Great War preserved. The new ticket hall’s stunning vaulted glass roof was built in the style of the western section of the original building which survived the bombing.
This redevelopment also allowed the platforms to be brought up to one standard level. Platforms 1 – 10 are served by the Circle, District and Hammersmith & City lines. Platforms 11 – 18 are served by the Piccadilly and Victoria Lines. The Stansted Express trains depart from Platforms 3 – 8. Getting your train to the right platform can be a little tricky; the information desks are helpful, and there is a dedicated desk for Stansted Express departures.
The redevelopment was designed by the architects Herzog & de Meuron, known for their skilful work with cultural buildings. But this is a case where the best intentions are marred by the worst of planning law. It’s an appalling shame that the City of London is proposing such ill-conceived, over-scaled office space when so many existing buildings sit empty post-Covid and post-Brexit.
Flexibility
Liverpool Street Station is one of the most well-connected in the city, with four London Underground lines stopping there, plus connections to mainline trains and even a direct express service to Stansted Airport. This enables workers to choose how they commute to their shared office in this vibrant part of town, which borders both the financial world of the City and the more alternative scene in Shoreditch.
A developer has plans to build a massive commercial block above the station concourse and a new hotel on the site of the old Great Eastern building, where Van Helsing stayed in Bram Stoker’s Dracula and which is protected by Historic England. But the plans look deeply ill-conceived: it doesn’t follow that simply upgrading passenger access to Liverpool Street needs a massive commercial building added on top of it, nor does the fact that this is a listed building mean that the proposed development can’t be negotiated down to something more modest.
In an era where flexible working patterns are increasingly common, the lack of flexi-ticketing options on the railway makes it less attractive for many people to travel by train. Changing this will make the UK a more flexible working friendly place. Fortunately, London has plenty of coworking spaces where people can work with flexibility in a range of different types of buildings.
Sustainability
The redevelopment of 100 Liverpool Street will deliver a high-performing, environmentally-friendly, low carbon office building. It is expected to achieve an ‘Outstanding’ BREEAM rating – the highest standard achievable, setting a new benchmark for city centre workplaces and positioning the scheme within the top 1% of sustainable office buildings in the UK.
One of London’s grand old Victorian termini, Liverpool Street Station and its adjoining Great Eastern Hotel (recently starred in the film Dracula as Van Helsing’s lodgings) are threatened with destructive development plans that would demolish the ornate concourse roof and a host of heritage elements. A coalition of heritage organisations, led by comedian, writer, actor and TV presenter Griff Rhys Jones as president of the Victorian Society has formed to oppose the project.
Sellar Property, who are partnering with Network Rail and Hong Kong-based transport operator MTR to redevelop the site, believe that their office, retail and leisure scheme will enable them to finance the significant infrastructure works without recourse to public funding. The redevelopment aims to improve accessibility, capacity and connectivity at the capital’s busiest station. This includes upgrading and expanding interchanges for Crossrail, increasing the number of lifts and escalators at the station, and providing step-free access to all London Underground platforms. A 25-metre outdoor pool – or City lido – is also proposed, along with new public gardens, rooftop restaurants and shops.
