York

Curves and archesIn the next couple of posts I’m looking back to my summer visit to York, with its magnificent railway station. I’m an admirer of the great train sheds of large Victorian stations. Their scale, and the elegant engineering that makes this possible, still inspire awe a century and a half or more after they were built. But there’s something especially admirable about York station – it’s built over a line that curves. Some 795 feet in length, the platforms are spanned by ribs that take the form of five-centred arches, coming to rest on stout Corinthian columns. These ribs are pierced with quatrefoils and circles, which gives them a lightness (both visual and in terms of weight), allowing the sun to shine through where the roof above is glazed. As the platform and the roof describe their gentle curves, there’s a pleasing visual counterpoint on a scale that’s unmatched in any other English station, with the exception of Newcastle. It’s a magnificent sweep, hardly noticed by…

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