INTRO: Robert Preston reports on station design concepts on London Underground’s Jubilee line extension and the Paris Météor line
ARCHITECTS and engineers working on major extensions to the metro networks in Paris and London have sought to create a better environment for passengers. In both cities the aim has been to banish the less pleasing aspects of underground railways and create stations where the passenger’s journey between street and train is simple, well-lit and secure.
London Underground’s Jubilee line is being extended by 16 km from Green Park in the city centre through southeast London and the Docklands redevelopment area to terminate in the inner eastern suburb of Stratford. Running largely below ground in twin bored tunnels, the extension will serve business and residential areas as well as major redevelopment sites. With the exception of Waterloo and Canada Water, designed by an in-house project team, the 11 stations on the route are the work of different architects, developed as individual entities within a general set of priorities.
The Jubilee line extension has been built on a generous scale. The largest station is at North Greenwich where a box 360m long, 20m wide and 20m deep has been excavated on a derelict site that will also host Britain’s millennium celebrations at the end of 1999.
Described by LU as ’the biggest underground station in the world’, North Greenwich has been designed by Alsop & St
