Town Hall planners give green light to new Hackney Central station entrance

The council has given the go-ahead for a new southern entrance for Hackney Central station at Graham Road, aimed at alleviating congestion on its busy platforms.

The site is currently taken up by the Garden of Earthly Delights, a community green space set up last year by XR Hackney, which is celebrating the apparent heeding of its calls for the entrance to be built with sustainability and the environment in mind.

Councillors on the planning committee unanimously voted for the scheme, while raising concerns that the design of the station represented a “missed opportunity” to create more of a landmark or provide affordable housing, though Town Hall officers moved to stress that the current plans have been designed so as not to prevent any future development on the land.

A spokesperson for the Garden said: “This feels like a great success. Hackney Council has been listening. We’re excited to see our site be turned into London’s ‘first green station entrance’. We hope that this can go even further now, starting to inspire other councils to a truly radical vision of what’s possible.

“These changes are deeply needed – greenery is vital for mental health and nature connection. Gardens create space for people to come together and share ideas, especially in difficult times.

“As a group, we’re now encouraging design methods such as permaculture and forest gardening, to grow food. These answer a lot of questions for us. It can be scary to both think and talk about big issues, such as climate change, loss of biodiversity. However, with innovative design of our cityscapes, we can address these in a very effective way. As they say, ‘all life’s problems can be solved in a garden’.”

Construction consultant Craig Latowsky said that, in response to representations, the scheme will include green roofs, paving to allow sustainable drainage, new planters, and a timber pergola to encourage planting, with modular building techniques to be used to speed up construction and avoid disruption.

Garden architect and coordinator Maria Chiara added: “We look forward to continue working with the council, to fill the planters with fruit trees, bushes, edible vines, and herbs. And we’ll be meeting together soon to discuss a new site for the Garden.

“It’s an exciting path. We strongly advocate innovative partnerships to form between local authorities and community groups, to access public land for food and nature. Let’s reimagine the landscape.”

Volunteers at the Garden have been helping local groups set up their own gardens and build planters, as well as taking part in tree planting and litter picks and working with groups who work with marginalised or isolated people.

Travellers will access the station through the ticket gate building due to open late next year at Graham Road before walking up stairs to Platform 1.

Councillors were told that cost ruled out a lift being provided for accessibility, with those requiring step free access having to go round the corner to the Amhurst Road entrance. Council officers said the route will be unobstructed with seating in between.

Transport for London (TfL) took over the station from Silverlink in 2007, since when it has become a “victim of its own success”, according to project manager Mark Peyton, who revealed that between 2017 and 2019 the station saw an increase of visitors of 10 per cent, from 6.64m people to 7.36m, equating to 13,000 in and 11,000 out every weekday.

Peyton added: “Obviously it has shown great growth, and we started looking at ways we could relieve the congestion. The platform is very narrow at the ticket office, where the steps are and the overbridge. We found that between 30 and 35 per cent of people go into the town centre and walk across Graham Road towards the Town Hall and Mare Street.

“We’ve been thinking hard and working with the local authority and Network Rail for a scheme that relieves the congestion and makes the station much friendlier and easy to use for all of our customers.”

Council officers said that “very careful thought” had gone into design details for the entrance, with the planning department’s eventual goal for a “substantial development” on the site with a station integrated into it, with the current plans designed to be “lightweight and dismantleable while high quality in the short term”.

Councillors nevertheless criticised the design as a “missed opportunity”, with planning committee chair Cllr Vincent Stops questioning officers on how to make sure that the temporary plans do not end up taking root for decades to come.

According to the council’s regeneration department, the council is already working with Network Rail and TfL for a “longer-term solution” for the station’s northern side, meaning that the Graham Road second entrance needs to be open for those plans to move forward.

Cllr Peter Snell said: “It’s all very well keeping it low-key. Can’t we do more with it? It’s a bit drab and rundown that far end of Graham Road, and I would have thought there would be nothing better than to advertise the fact that this is now a hugely successful station.

“The current entrance is hidden away at the back of a car park – shouldn’t we be celebrating what has been a great success, entirely due to the Labour party I might suggest, of getting that line into use, a popular line and creating an outer London circular route – let’s celebrate it and try and do something more. I’m not going to vote against it, but I feel it is a lost opportunity.”

Latowsky reassured those listening that the entrance to appear in 2021 would be a “proper entrance”, with the design tailored to meet immediate need, adding: “I know that Hackney, Network Rail and TfL will be working together to look at future opportunities for this site and a bigger development. This is not a stopgap or temporary, but it is a solution for now, and it is designed so it will not stop any future development on the site in the future.”

Hackney Mayor Philip Glanville said: “I am pleased that plans for a much-needed new entrance for Hackney Central station have got the go ahead. Anyone who uses the station will know how overcrowded and busy the station can become, and the existing station entrance is now too small to handle the current volume of passengers passing through it, especially during peak periods and for more vulnerable users.

“By providing our own land to create a southern entrance, this partnership and joint investment is the first part of a longer term solution to issues around the station – which will eventually unlock the opportunity to comprehensively refurbish the north side of the station to make sure it too provides the safe and welcoming arrival to Hackney Central that passengers deserve.”

Rory O’Neill, TfL’s general manager for London Overground, said: “It’s great news that plans for this new station entrance at Hackney Central have been approved. It will provide customers with easier access to the town centre and help reduce pressure on the existing entrance, which will make the customer experience in the station more pleasant. We look forward to welcoming customers through this new entrance in late 2021.”