HS2 will terminate at Euston, Rishi Sunak has confirmed. The PM added that work on the London terminus would be taken out of the hands of HS2 Ltd and handed to a new Euston Development Zone. Extra homes are expected, along with a reimagined entrance and additional platforms. At one stage, an ambitious proposal was put forward to rebuild Euston Arch, which once guarded the station. Given the wider issues that have dogged the high-speed rail project, it should come as no surprise to learn that this idea seems to have fallen by the wayside.
Having stood for more than a century, the 70-foot arch was demolished in 1962 despite a public outcry. “In spite of being one of the outstanding architectural creations of the early 19th century and the most important – and visually satisfying – monument to the railway age which Britain pioneered, the united efforts of many organisations and individuals failed to save it in the face of official apathy and philistinism,” wrote the Architectural Review at the time.
Here we examine how the rest of London’s oldest railway stations once looked…
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