The redevelopment of Victoria Station and integration of Westminster amplifies social and experiential opportunity, articulates architectural and landscape icons, creates beneficial urban space, and addresses human, infrastructural, and natural ecology for a better London.
A ring of woodlands, grasslands, marshlands, and wetlands runs along the Thames and connects through Victoria Station. Punctuated unifying shifts in landscape result in urban place-making that provides legible understanding of the system as a wayfinding device. Varying landscapes/systems work together using low impact development techniques to handle water. This protects existing urban biomes, establishes habitats in the new wetlands of the Thames, and encourages exploration and understanding at a city scale.
At Victoria Station, the site history and future guide redevelopment in cooperation with experiential qualities and the spectacle of transit. Victoria regains its sense of self from overwhelming existing conditions. The new architecture clearly expresses the dialogue between the new Victoria and past influences that shaped it.
A renewed Pimlico Wharf wetland in the proposed Underground ticket-hall activates the grassland forecourt above. Light and water filter through the platforms demonstrating the interconnectivity of landscape, architecture, and infrastructure. The greater impact throughout Westminster is exemplified here making Victoria a living laboratory and compass. The new station entry reveals the column grid supporting the Grosvenor Hotel with improved access between transit systems. The interior receives an extended Rail/Air Deck along the existing structures providing an upper level for refuge while alleviating congestion on the main concourse.
This proposal reinvigorates the inherent beauty and identity of Victoria Station while simultaneously connecting it and the City of Westminster.
Victoria Station | Ian M. Ellis & Nelly Fuentes
Competition Entry for Green Infrastructure Ideas Design Competition 2012
