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By Ruth Leach on

Station Hall redevelopment in pictures

Catch up with the progress of our ambitious redevelopment of Station Hall.

I’m Ruth Leach, an Interpretation Developer here at the National Railway Museum, and I’m part of the team working on the Station Hall redevelopment.  The last few weeks have seen some really exciting work being carried out in Station Hall, and I wanted to take the opportunity to show you some images from behind the scenes.

As Joe mentioned in his previous post, we undertook a major shunt which made Station Hall feel very empty…
To improve the routes around the hall we’ve built some new ramps. We used a very cool robot drill to remove some surplus concrete.
Bringing our road vehicles back to life – albeit with the help of a tow rope and fork lift.
Moving the clock from the original Euston Station was no mean feat…
Some of our fantastic enamel signs waiting to be installed.
We’ve also fitted new panels to fill the platform gaps – here a decorative detail on Queen Victoria’s saloon peeks through

8 comments on “Station Hall redevelopment in pictures

  1. Little concerned that from appearances in the above picture the lions head on Queen Victoria’s salloon looks vulnerable to careless boots with the cut away in the platform being quite so close to it. It could of course be an illusion of the picture of course.

  2. I agree with Tom, it does look very kick-able. I also wonder about the extra panels to fill platform gaps. If people can manage on real railways when the trains might move, is it too difficult in the museum ? I’d have thought if you were worried, a vertical panel along the platform edge would be better. Mind you, people are pretty stupid these days !

  3. Hi Tom & Phil (hope you don’t mind me replying to you both at once),

    I think it is probably a case of the picture making it look more vulnerable than it is in reality – the panel is a lot deeper than shown on the photo. You might remember the acrylic panels that were in place previously? These were deemed to be unsafe, so this is our next attempt at meeting a lot of different needs – health and safety, equitable access etc. Obviously these are requirements that we are statutorily required to meet, whilst also trying to preserve our collection, and display it in a realistic way. I’m not sure if anyone has managed to get that difficult balancing act right yet!

    Finally, Tom – we also have vertical panels at certain points, and we’ve used these to house some basic contextual information about the vehicles. If you are planning on visiting soon, I’d be interested to hear what you (and anybody else!) thinks about this information.

    Ruth.

    1. Hi Ruth,
      Thanks for the reply, that is reasuring. Yes it is a dificult problem, we had it on a much smaller scale in a museum I was deputy manager of. It was in a medieval church with a false floor above the original that had gaps around the base of the pillars, that was a tricky enough one to crack though I’m not sure we did completely. I dread to think the dificulty you have.
      Hopefully visiting NRM this week so will gladly let you know what I think. Would you like me to post feedback here or via another method? I am looking forward to seeing the revamped displays in Station Hall, glad it’s been done at last. I remember visting it on a special tour pre public opening when it was just the Peter Allen building.

      Tom

    2. I hated to see the Perspex panels, but these solid ones are dreadful. You may as well put the real exhibits in store and replace them with printed cut-outs. Trains in that part of the museum no longer have wheels. BUT you are all clearly missing a key point here and it’s is about time “Health and Safety” was kicked back under a rock where it belongs, because this relentless stupidity is going to cause deaths.
      The NRM is supposed to be about education, and there is NO safer place to teach a child about “the gap”, trackwork and turnouts…. and now you have covered it over and pretend that being on a railway platform is safe! Thank goodness I was able to teach my daughter before it was too late. Because when I took her to India at just 13 years old, she knew about platform gaps, missing corridor connections and bouncing fall plates, and the danger of point blades! The NRM is no longer a place of valuable, life saving learning.
      Contrary to the official point of view, railways are a very safe environment after a little education, and we still have to suffer the relentless pursuit of more and more costly fences and safety measures…. yet the most dangerous thing everyone had to do, by a large measure, was walk alongside or cross a road on the way into the museum.
      I have a sign in the back of my car that says “In event of an accident, do not revive the driver”. And I really do mean it. I can’t stand the stupidity for much longer!

      1. Dear David,

        Thank you for your feedback. As I’ve mentioned in some of my previous posts, we introduced the current panels for a number of reasons. As a public institution we have to comply with health and safety legislation, as well as meet the requirements of our insurers. We are simply unable to open our doors to the public if we don’t do this.

        Our aim is to provide a variety of experiences across our site – the rolling stock in the Great Hall is viewable from track level, and in the South Yard visitors are able to get up close to the working railway. Our Learning team also run a ‘Trackwise’ workshop for school groups, which educates children about rail safety.

        Ruth.

      2. David – If you watch commercial television during the day you’ll understand why the NRM has to not only comply with H&S legislation but goldplate it to placate the insurers. Ever since commercial break features an advert for ambulance chasing lawyers. There is a significant segment of the population that would happily stuff their legs in to gaps if they thought a decent payout would be forthcoming. It’s not that the museum would have done anything wrong, it’s that the legal costs would be so great that every item of rolling stock would have to be sold to pay for them.

        It IS wrong that this is the case IMHO and the H&S Executive is probably on your side, they hate all the over the top H&S stuff invented by people who know little but like to proclaim lots, but it is the way of the world. If you aren’t happy, lobby your MP to do something about all the “no win no fee” lawyers.

  4. Hi Tom,

    You can either post on here or send an email to the project email address: stationhall@nrm.org.uk. For more information on the project there’s also a page at nrm.org.uk/stationhall. What you’ll see on your visit is very much the start of our plans for Station Hall, and there’ll be lots more to come over the next year or so.

    Ruth.

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