Scheme will require closure of key access road into central York
York city council has given the green light to Feilden Fowles’ controversial plans for a major expansion of the National Railway Museum following a four-hour debate.
Planning committee chair Chris Cullwick pushed the scheme over the finishing line with his deciding vote after councillors reached an impasse with five votes for and five against.
It means that Leeman Road, which is the main access route into the city centre and railway station for thousands of people, will be permanently closed to make way for the expansion.
The plans, which received nearly 100 objections, will unite the museum’s two main sites on either side of the road with a large rotunda, known as the Central Hall.
It is part of a wider £55m expansion of the museum’s two sites, the other being located in County Durham, which aims to transform them into the world’s leading railway museums and a “global engineering powerhouse”.
AOC-designed plans for a £5.4m building at the County Durham site which will store up to 50 rail vehicles were approved in June.
Landscape architect Optimised Environments were also awarded a role on the redevelopment last month.
Feilden Fowles have said the two-storey Central Hall structure, which is topped by radial beams of Douglas Fir timber, was inspired by the history of locomotive roundhouses and railway turntables.
A first-floor balcony will offer views of York, while five doors at ground level will lead to different parts of the museum including a new exhibition hall.
The practice was awarded the design job in spring 2020, beating shortlist rivals Carmody Groarke, Heneghan Peng and France’s Atelier d’Architecture Philippe Prost in an international competition.
The York museum, which is based in the former York North locomotive depot, is the largest of its kind in the UK and had nearly 800,000 visitors in 2018/19.
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