The larger entrance into Moorgate tube station, which closed in 2011 for Crossrail works, has reopened with lifts and a cleaner wider appearance.
The opening of the old entrance comes as the Moorgate-Liverpool Street station built by Crossrail is formally handed over to TfL to manage.
Due to the length of the trains, the future Elizabeth line stations are so long that in a couple of places they link two separate London Underground stations – here Moorgate and Liverpool Street. The deep platforms have a middle corridor that people will be able to use to get between either tube station. When the Elizabeth line opens, customers at Liverpool Street will be able to use Moorgate tube station, as well as the new entrance at Broadgate, to access Elizabeth line services.
Although it has an entrance at Moorgate, the station will always be shown on Elizabeth line maps and tube maps as Liverpool Street, with a connection to Moorgate.
Liverpool Street’s Elizabeth line station, which was built by Laing O’Rourke, is the fifth station to be transferred to TfL and the third station which London Underground will take over as infrastructure manager. Station and maintenance staff can begin familiarisation at the station ahead of the Elizabeth line opening.
As part of the work undertaken by Crossrail, a refurbished station entrance for Moorgate station on Moorfields is now open. Step-free access to the Circle, Metropolitan and Hammersmith & City lines has been provided with new lifts serving the eastbound and westbound platforms. The new entrance is more spacious at 65 metres wide, with a longer gateline, six new ticket vending machines and large information screens right by the entrance.
Step-free access to the Northern line at Moorgate using new lifts will be available when the Elizabeth line opens, currently scheduled for “as soon as possible in the first half of 2022”.
The Liverpool Street Elizabeth line station is the deepest of the new central London stations (34 metres below ground at platform level) and has a total of 15 escalators and seven lifts. Two of these are inclined lifts at the Broadgate entrance to take passengers from the street to platform level.
The grooved and angled ceilings in the ticket halls were formed from pre-cast concrete panels instead of a flat ceiling to create a greater sense of space and movement and resemble the pinstripes often seen in the suits of City workers.
The Moorgate ticket hall is accessed at street level through a wide entrance which is framed by blue glass. A protective gantry with scaffolding remains above the new entrance related to the over-site development being built by Land Securities (21 Moorfields).
Staircase from refurbished ticket hall to eastbound subsurface platform
New lift to street level on eastbound platform
Enlarged Moorfields ticket hall
Four of the six new ticket machines
Next train indicators in front of the entrance
Refurbished staircase to the ticket hall
People see a tube station, and just use it as if it’s always been there
CGI of the planned oversite development
The old entrance – dinosaur optional. From Doctor Who Invasion of the Dinosaurs 1974
A major failure at Moorgate Station is the lift to the Northern Line won’t serve the mainline Great Northern line terminus but simply go by with no facility for passengers to use what would have been one of the simplest accessible interchanges in the world ! This is made worse by new that Network Rail is about to begin work making Finsbury Park Station fully accessible but the failure at Moorgate will mean lift interchange between Great Northern and Elizabeth Line and other lines at Moorgate won’t be possible.
While at the opposite end of the station no step free access will be available at Liverpool Street Station to the Central line or westbound circle etc platform.
One would think that main line stations deserve to be made fully accessible!
The cash for retrofitting step free access on National Rail is provided by the Department for Transport (i.e. HM Treasury) If Central Government money (as opposed to that from a developer) is required then it has to pass the BCR test. At Moorgate, the lift installation has been complex and expensive so if NR wanted lift access it would have had to stump up more than ‘just’ the cost of a lift entrance. (Apparently TfL did ask NR – but the offer to contribute was declined) That in turn probably pushes the BCR below acceptable (to DfT / HM Treasury) levels – particularly as step free access could be achieved by directing passengers to circulate via Kings Cross.
I wonder if the fake space ship and headquarters of Operation Golden Age are still accessible via the old entrance… 😉