King’s Cross Square will be one of London’s most high-profile public realm projects – as significant to its setting as Trafalgar Square and Marble Arch are to theirs. The 7000m2 plaza will primarily serve as an arrival threshold for King’s Cross railway station, which is currently undergoing a major programme of restoration and improvement. It will be used by hundreds of thousands of railway and London Underground travellers, and crossed by thousands of pedestrians on one of London’s busiest cross-city routes.
The Square will also be at the heart of a broader programme of urban regeneration. King’s Cross has historically been one of London’s poorest districts – the nearby slum of St Giles was the setting for the Charles Dickens novel, Oliver Twist. Today, however, the whole area is being transformed by two massive urban regeneration schemes at Regent Quarter and King’s Cross Central. Along with the recent modernisation of the historically significant St Pancras station, they’re combining to inject new energy and activity into the area.
