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Old December 14th 17, 12:15 PM posted to uk.transport.london,misc.transport.urban-transit,uk.railway
Roland Perry Roland Perry is offline
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First recorded activity at LondonBanter: Aug 2003
Posts: 10,125
Default London's Elizabeth Line's disjointed introduction

In message , at 11:15:18 on
Thu, 14 Dec 2017, e27002 aurora remarked:

TfL's facilities known as Kings Cross/St Pancras station are a
convoluted horrible mess of which TfL should be thoroughly ashamed.
Even though the station is advertised as "step free", anyone with
walking difficulties would have a hard time negotiating the distances
underground.


I don't think the "step free" facilities are intended for people who
can't walk very far (I've helped such folks negotiate several stations
including Kings Cross) but are to tick a box that says "wheelchair
friendly". And as a side effect "pram the size of an SUV friendly".

It doesn't mean that such acts of friendliness should be deprecated, but
sometimes they could be much better done.

Actually, the lift down to the Northern Line platforms is in the classic
ticket hall, and could hardly be more convenient. I normally use it in
preference to the escalators, anyway.

They lost a significant opportunity by not putting a lift near the
Platform 1 buffers down to what would be virtually above the small lift
to the Piccadilly Line. And despite still having some passageway would
have been a substantial short-cut to the Victoria Line.

OTOH, above ground, the NR Kings Cross improvements, undertaken during
the period when Network Rail was private,


I don't think NR was ever "private", although its status changed very
slightly wrt its debt being on or off the books.

are a magnificent blending
of old and new to create a very pleasant and functional station.


The Northern Ticket Hall (largely responsible for the extended walks to
the deep tube) is part of the Kings Cross redevelopment, not St Pancras.
The main escalators from there to the new concourse are in a very
inconvenient place. And there's no excuse for the escalator up to the
suburban platforms being a single tidal flow rather than a pair.

The toilet facilities on the mezzanine are a joke, as is the lack of a
pedestrian exit from the main platforms via the mezzanine. The resulting
walk to St Pancras (via the buffers) is much extended.

The area between the shed buffers and the flying saucer is a complete
botch. Arriving, you have to go outside to get to the flying saucer, and
when the scrum at the inadequate number of barriers when 12-car loads of
people try to access one train in under ten minutes is absurd.

Similarly, if you exit the tube via the steps/lift just outside the
building there, the route to the flying saucer is definitely an
afterthought. The answer, of course, would have been another exit from
the north/south TfL passageway on the other side, for people heading for
the ticket office/departure boards from the classic/subsurface halls.

The contrast could not be more stark.


They both have good and bad features.
--
Roland Perry