Birmingham's long-awaited new Grand Central shopping centre, plonked unceremoniusly on top of New Street station, has been open now for some time. The second city's denizens have had sufficient time to give themselves undue neck-ache looking at the giant boil of a glass ceiling, before an irate and late traveller almost knocks them flat while hurrying for their train.
Social media has, so far, been kind: likening the new money-sucking endeavour as having the potential to rival Manchester Piccadilly and London St. Pancras in the travel/shopping experience stakes.
However, this is swept away by the experience the travellers actually have before reaching New Street and when boarding a train at it. Aside from whitening several platforms and walls, adding staircases and suchlike, what has actually happened to the station itself? You know, the station-y bit of the station. Where the trains actually come in and out, and people vie for comfortable standing-spaces in their vestibules.
Having been likened to a dungeon in the past, you'd think lashings of lolly would have been targeted at making the sub-level experience slightly less hellish. But no: the price Brummies pay for having a truly city-centre station (an admitted benefit) is still ongoing - and the dark, miserable trains-and-tracks bit is still as unedifying as ever.
Trains still jostle for platform space, evidenced by the waiting game played by every fifth train attempting to enter New Street. Rolling stock is still barely covering the requirements.
Tossing a few wanderers into the paths of hurrying commuters and adorning the building with a frankly hideous array of reflective nonsense will not allay the worsening bottleneck. These problems can only worsen, too, given general reluctance to procure new trains, along with the other time-honoured chestnuts - growing population numbers, growing passenger levels, etc.
It is frankly laughable to consider Manchester Piccadilly and London St. Pancras to New Street. For those who have yet to visit these, it is almost advisable not to as New Street will only worsen in comparison. Out of the capital's numerous terminals and large-scale stations, perhaps New Street is on a par with Euston, being a similar sardine-ramming concrete assault (con)course.
Euston aside, London still has the delights of Paddington, King's Cross, the aforementioned St. Pancras as well as Victoria. Each of these, whilst perhaps not intricately comparable to New Street due to various factors, are spacious and welcoming spaces.
So, what's to be done about New Street? Trains can only lengthened so much, platforms less so. If HS2 wasn't on the horizon, a satellite station of sorts could be built in the place of the planned Curzon Street terminus, with certain services' inter-connectivity sacrificed.
No envy emanates from this quarter for those charged with finding such solutions. Thankfully, we also have the gloriously retro and tasteful Moor Street, sadly beaten down by its neighbouring Snow Hill, the bastard concrete spawn of New Street. An online perusal at 1960s-era Snow Hill is a painful experience, as it less resembles a fallout shelter and more an attractive travel hub/venue.
With the exciting Midland Metro expansion and the HS2 terminus planned, we cannot afford to have any weak links in Birmingham's idealised city connectivity. Making New Street's platform levels attractive, however, may be akin to planting plastic flowers in Mordor.
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