On 10 July, 16:14, "Paul Scott"
wrote:
"D DB 90001" wrote in ...

Hopefully, the plan in the long term will be either an extra bridge,
or widening of existing infrastructure and an extra set of stairs; no
idea if that's the official plan tho.

Details are available on Westminster's planning website:

http://idocs.westminster.gov.uk:8080...cs.do?appNumbe...

The 'design and access statement', figure 3.2.2 is a relevant section, but
the text quality is very poor.

The rebuilt H&C station has its own access routes from the main station, and
a dedicated gateline, leading to three sets of stairs and a lift down to
P15/16. *The existing footbridge will not provide a direct interchange route
from 10/11/13/14 to the LU platforms, you'll have to leave via a dedicated
gateline, and re-enter the underground's gateline. *(And vice versa of
course)

Paul S

Many, many thanks for digging this up, I would have looked for it
myself, but I didn't have a clue where to start!

As you say, the future plans for the Northern end of Paddington look
much more promising. An extra set of gatelines to pass through if you
are coming from platforms 13/14 or 10/11, but passengers from 8/9 and
1-7 can use the southern bridge and avoid the gated area (via 13/14
and 10/11); (had to re-read several of the documents a few times to
understand the complex layout, but eventually got it!) Then there is a
completely new gateline for platforms 15/16 with 3 sets of stairs for
the H&C/C platforms as you mentioned; this should ease overcrowding on
the 13/14-10/11 bridge because passengers changing from H&C to IC FGW
services won't have to use that Northern bridge, but can use the
Southern bridge instead (and NO gates on that bridge).

In the short term though they really should reopen the second set of
stairs between 13/14 and 15/16 in order to allow a full one-way system
between H&C/C services. Access TO H&C/C would be via platform 12 and
the newly reopened bridge; and access FROM H&C/C to FGW services via
the existing Northern Bridge - simply making the barriers on that
bridge permenantly one-way in order to prevent dangerous bi-
directional passenger movements. Since there are already barriers
preventing unauthorised access to Platform 12, unless a passenger
leaves via the Northern exit via a rather convoluted route there is
very minimal risk of revenue loss. Passengers changing between H&C/C
and suburban services wouldn't need to touch in since their journey
would just continue as normal as it does now. (Yes, I know the one-way
solution has already been mentioned, apologies for repeating that,
just did it for completeness.)

The question is, with the problem of the congestion on the stairs to
platforms 15/16 and the related overbridge, why the Hell is the second
set of stairs (and related overbridge) not operational currently?
Ironically this overbridge is slated for demolition as part of the
plans for the new H&C Paddington Northern entrance!

Once again, many thanks for the link to the planning documents, found
them to be very illuminating - despite being near-impossible to read!
Highly recommend them for further reading.