St Pancras High Level Concourse - How Did it Ever Get Past Planning?

[EM2]

The issue is surely just because of the EMT policy re boarding. If they let people on to the platform 15-20 minutes before departure, there wouldn't be a problem.

When I was working there, boarding would generally be around then. Have things changed recently?

 

[Kettledrum]

This google earth link shows the side of the station where I would want to build out over the road to accommodate additional space, ticket barriers and exits, and new escalators down to the taxi area. Much easier said than done though.
https://www.google.co.uk/maps/@51.5317666,-0.1274575,3a,75y,6.64h,95.19t/data=!3m6!1e1!3m4!1ssMeXxYkVPhxT4071nKDZAQ!2e0!7i13312!8i6656

 

[Kettledrum]

When I was working there, boarding would generally be around then. Have things changed recently?

.

In my experience gates open 5-10 minutes before departure time on many of the peak time services that I'm on. This creates a crush of impatient panicking customers at the ticket barriers. Elderly passengers, they can easily take that time to walk to their coach on the train.

 

[gazthomas]

I agree with the poor design and lack of capacity for domestic services. The Thameslink route was closed when I travelled on Sunday so we came into the Midland Mainline platforms. It was chaos, not helped by a "funnel" no doubt put in place to slow things down at the gates.

 

[61653 HTAFC]

The biggest issue is not the design or the layout, it's EMT's boarding policy. Solve that and most of the issues disappear. That said, both domestic areas of the station do feel like afterthoughts a bit. I was really looking forward to experiencing the international part last month, but when I did I was disappointed* that there's this wonderful building that people barely get to savour before being hurried on board or out... unless you're a 1%er who can afford to use the Champagne Bar, that is!

*That disappointment subsided slightly upon arrival at Bruxelles Midi. What a dump!

 

[Bald Rick]

This google earth link shows the side of the station where I would want to build out over the road to accommodate additional space, ticket barriers and exits, and new escalators down to the taxi area. Much easier said than done though.
https://www.google.co.uk/maps/@51.5317666,-0.1274575,3a,75y,6.64h,95.19t/data=!3m6!1e1!3m4!1ssMeXxYkVPhxT4071nKDZAQ!2e0!7i13312!8i6656

There's the small matter of a station underneath the road, which means you can't put any foundations in to support anything....

 

[EM2]

Another issue is that you have three trains that leave within twenty minutes (xx:55, xx:00 and xx:15), then you have two in five minutes (xx:25 and xx:30) and then nothing for another twenty-five minutes until the next xx:55.

 

[Dr Hoo]

In the latest of thousands of journeys through St Pancras over the past 20-plus years I have just successfully breezed through the barriers 15 minutes before departure time for a train, on which I am now sitting comfortably.

Earlier posters have made it clear that there is usually no need to spend ages hanging around upstairs when there are so many ways to pass a few minutes in warmer surroundings downstairs.

Yes, of course things can get a bit cosy at the MML/EMT barriers during Thameslink blockades or sudden influxes of unfamiliar ECML divertees during disruption but generally the station functions very well, given its unique mix of architectural, geographical, security and operational constraints.

 

[yorksrob]

It's not very wide off memory (risk of congestion) and doesn't take you anywhere particularly useful from the SEHS platforms (only to the narrow steps down to the Western tube ticket hall and a convoluted route to a narrow busy pavement on Euston Road). Most pax just want to directly exit the station or go into the tube.

It does lead directly to the front of the station, and in many cases as a pedestrian, getting straight to and from the Euston Road is the most direct route to the centre of town. The "main" entrance to the SE platforms is by contrast, down a bit of a back street.

 

[yorksrob]

It was open and walled off during the Olympics, but with agency crowd-control staff positioned all the way along.

You probably wouldn't have as many crowds most of the time as during the olympics !

 

[yorksrob]

Nice bit of autocorrect there.

Mobile phones. Don't you just luv 'em

 

[whhistle]

How many platforms were ther before?
How many do Eurostar take now?
Surely you need 4 for Eurostar, 2 or 3 for HS1 and the rest for EMT?
I mean, it's a station not a depot... :P

I say this with no knowledge of the space requirements though.

 

[yorksrob]

How many platforms were ther before?
How many do Eurostar take now?
Surely you need 4 for Eurostar, 2 or 3 for HS1 and the rest for EMT?
I mean, it's a station not a depot... :P

I say this with no knowledge of the space requirements though.

I think it used to have six. To be fair, it was a fairly quiet terminal once the local services had gone over to Thameslink.

 

[edwin_m]

IIRC there were seven platform tracks in the trainshed, but one was a short platform right up against the west wall and it was disconnected in later years. There was a wide platform between the eastern pair and the others, which I believe was used for loading mail from vans that came in through the large arch in the end wall. There are now six Eurostar platforms tracks accessed from three islands - they can probably make do with fewer than that but in my view it would be short-sighted to take any out as it could stymie growth of international services in the future.

It is reported in Modern Railways that some EMT trains will have to have longer layovers because of the new Thameslink timetable (they are taking on the HSTs from GC to counter the resulting stock shortage). I don't know if this means boarding will be earlier on the peak services were it tends to be last minute at present. The idea of keeping people downstairs is all very well, but they will tend to drift upstairs 10-15min before departure especially if they know it's quite a long walk via the up escalators and boading is likely to be a scrum.

 

[EM2]

How many platforms were ther before?
How many do Eurostar take now?
Surely you need 4 for Eurostar, 2 or 3 for HS1 and the rest for EMT?
I mean, it's a station not a depot... :P

I say this with no knowledge of the space requirements though.

Well, Eurostar only has one more than you suggest, Southeastern have three and EMT have four.

 

[CyrusWuff]

One thing that seems to be being overlooked is that the layout for St Pancras was essentially set in stone way back in the 90s, prior to Midland Mainline (under National Express) introducing the Turbostars and doubling the frequency. At the point of that "design freeze", four platforms were sufficient for the train service being provided.

At one point, there was a proposal that Platform 5 could be made available for both domestic and international services if necessary, as it could be isolated from the other international platforms, but that was dropped at some stage of the rebuild.

 

[Mutant Lemming]

Like this? There are at least two of these before you get the escalator up to p1-4

..and what a useless waste of time and effort they are too - they continually flit between pages not giving people enough time to locate their trains or where they stop

 

[DanTrain]

St Pancras suffers accutely from being a shopping mall, making it very difficult to change between EMT and anything, getting to KX underground requires an extended tour of the station with patchy signage at best. It really needs more thought putting into to those who actually use it as an interchange rather than a tourist destination in itself!

 

[Clip]

I would be amazed if fully qualified architects and engineers didn't spend years thinking over all the above permutations before settling on the final design for the station - taking in everything they searched for in the planning stages... Then again who knows - easier to comment when its finally done without actually knowing what you are on about

 

[Mikey C]

St Pancras suffers accutely from being a shopping mall, making it very difficult to change between EMT and anything, getting to KX underground requires an extended tour of the station with patchy signage at best. It really needs more thought putting into to those who actually use it as an interchange rather than a tourist destination in itself!

I fine the northern ticket office to be a reasonable way in to the Underground from STP, and not too far from the EMT and Javelin trains, plus the otherwise rather inconveniently located Thameslink platforms

 

[yorksrob]

One thing that seems to be being overlooked is that the layout for St Pancras was essentially set in stone way back in the 90s, prior to Midland Mainline (under National Express) introducing the Turbostars and doubling the frequency. At the point of that "design freeze", four platforms were sufficient for the train service being provided.

At one point, there was a proposal that Platform 5 could be made available for both domestic and international services if necessary, as it could be isolated from the other international platforms, but that was dropped at some stage of the rebuild.

Since platform 5 was presumably built in the same place as intended, could they perhaps build this back in at some stage ?

 

[jopsuk]

I can't see how, as built, Platform 5 could be isolated- it's a single island with Platform 6.

 

[Taunton]

It really needs more thought putting into to those who actually use it as an interchange rather than a tourist destination in itself!

I suspect architects looking to get design awards from fellow architects (viewed on a quiet winter's morning) was also a primary consideration.

 

[Dr Hoo]

I think that we are still waiting for any member of the forum to come up with a better 'packaging' of areas of the station and different lines and modes (also taking into account King's Cross). Allowing for train lengths, curvature, positioning of pre-existing Underground lines, listed buildings, the Regents Canal, Fleet River and so on we were never going to get 'anything' immediately adjacent to 'everything else' within anything like the current footprint.

As I understand it Berlin Hbf may have had a slightly simpler (and broader) canvas with which to work but has still had its critics.

Anyway, the new Crossrail 2 station will provide plenty of scope for further debate.

 

[Taunton]

A good start would have been to do away with the waste of space at the upper level on the west side with the open atrium (ie nothing), which may look grand for the shopping mall down below (and at the moment allows a Christmas tree which rivals Trafalgar Square), and instead have retained the tracks and platforms down towards the old bufferstop line for the MML. I can understand they didn't want smelly diesels (HSTs) or roaring when at rest diesels (Meridians) inside, but given that the first 50 miles of the MML has long been electrified and bi-modes have been practical for longer than the project has been open, this should not have been insuperable at all.

 

[Ianno87]

A good start would have been to do away with the waste of space at the upper level on the west side with the open atrium (ie nothing), which may look grand for the shopping mall down below (and at the moment allows a Christmas tree which rivals Trafalgar Square), and instead have retained the tracks and platforms down towards the old bufferstop line for the MML. I can understand they didn't want smelly diesels (HSTs) or roaring when at rest diesels (Meridians) inside, but given that the first 50 miles of the MML has long been electrified and bi-modes have been practical for longer than the project has been open, this should not have been insuperable at all.

The opening both allows a heck of a lot of natural light down to the shopping mall (it'd be pretty dingy otherwise), and for people in the mall to admire the Barlow trainshed.

And even if it was covered over, I don't know quite how you'd squeeze 4 MML platforms into the remaiming width alongside the Eurostar platforms as-is. Two at a push, perhaps. With zero passenger circulation space.

 

[Bald Rick]

I can't believe it's taken 10 years for all the whinges and 'it could have been done better' posts to come out.

For what it's worth, as a daily user, I think it's absolutely magnificent.

 

[jon0844]

The opening both allows a heck of a lot of natural light down to the shopping mall (it'd be pretty dingy otherwise), and for people in the mall to admire the Barlow trainshed.

You could maybe reduce the open space for below to give more standing area, not to extend any platforms?

 

[CyrusWuff]

I can't see how, as built, Platform 5 could be isolated- it's a single island with Platform 6.

I can't remember the specifics, and can't find a planning application on Camden's website, but it definitely featured in plans I saw.

Given the facility wasn't expected to be used regularly and they'd hopefully have advance warning, it may have been as simple as having temporary fencing they could deploy between 5 and 6.

 

[Dr Hoo]

You could maybe reduce the open space for below to give more standing area, not to extend any platforms?

Surely any public transport system that has to 'design in' space for many hundreds of passengers to just stand around for lengthy periods on a regular basis has fundamentally failed. (I am obviously not talking about occasional events like Glastonbury crowds at Castle Cary.)

The frequency and reliability of services both in and out of an interchange should allow most users to make relatively continuous progress.

There will always be a proportion of passengers who will be around for longer and these need to be both catered for and 'managed' to ensure that there is no continuous 20-deep scrum around the barriers.

General terminal planning at airports (separation of arrivals and departures) and major stations has developed to use multi-level formats with facilities designed to encourage at least a significant share of people to 'stay out of the way until the right juncture'. The availability and clarity of information is a major part of this art.

In general terms I think that St Pancras achieves this very well. As a regular user I will often mooch across to King's Cross for a bit of variety of coffee houses, bars and shops too. With Real Time Trains on my phone I neither stand around aimlessly nor miss my train.