On Friday, 20 November 2015 13:59:32 UTC, Recliner wrote:
Several years before the trains arrive, the development above the
Canary Wharf Crossrail station opened this summer, and I finally got
around to visiting it on a rainy morning yesterday.

This station is pretty spectacular, just as the Canary Wharf DLR and
Jubilee line stations already are. I think that, in each case, Canary
Wharf has the stand-out station on the line. But, unfortunately, the
three stations are all physically some distance apart, so they're not
convenient for connecting between the lines.

Work is of course very much continuing down in the basement, but
you're hardly aware of it when you visit Crossrail Place, as the
overstation development is known. The shops, restaurants and rooftop
garden are open, and serving the workers in the nearby office towers.
It's definitely worth a visit if you've not been yet.

Some pictures:
https://www.flickr.com/photos/reclin...57660672783597

Wow. Thanks for the photos. They are spectacular. Pity the sun wasn't brighter.
The area is what I imagine Toronto looks like.

It also reminds me, oddly of Portmeirion in The Prisoner, owing to the omnipresent surveillance, its self-containedness, the typeface used for the street signs and the sameness of the people who work there. I don't necessarily mean that as a criticism.

Offramp wrote:
On Friday, 20 November 2015 13:59:32 UTC, Recliner wrote:
Several years before the trains arrive, the development above the
Canary Wharf Crossrail station opened this summer, and I finally got
around to visiting it on a rainy morning yesterday.

This station is pretty spectacular, just as the Canary Wharf DLR and
Jubilee line stations already are. I think that, in each case, Canary
Wharf has the stand-out station on the line. But, unfortunately, the
three stations are all physically some distance apart, so they're not
convenient for connecting between the lines.

Work is of course very much continuing down in the basement, but
you're hardly aware of it when you visit Crossrail Place, as the
overstation development is known. The shops, restaurants and rooftop
garden are open, and serving the workers in the nearby office towers.
It's definitely worth a visit if you've not been yet.

Some pictures:
https://www.flickr.com/photos/reclin...57660672783597

Wow. Thanks for the photos. They are spectacular. Pity the sun wasn't brighter.
The area is what I imagine Toronto looks like.

It also reminds me, oddly of Portmeirion in The Prisoner, owing to the
omnipresent surveillance, its self-containedness, the typeface used for
the street signs and the sameness of the people who work there. I don't
necessarily mean that as a criticism.

That's an interesting comparison. Obviously you don't feel imprisoned, but
you're right about the other points. I'll look out for mysterious white
spheres bouncing along the water next time I'm in the area!

Like Portmeirion, it's a private space that purports to be public. But at
least nobody challenged me from wandering around taking photos, which did
happen when I did the same at Greenford a few days earlier.