The beloved Elizabeth Line has been shortlisted for a design award alongside some seriously swanky London landmarks.
It has air con, on-train Wi-Fi, and back when the Lizzy line opened, you could even get some nifty purple tote bags.
But would you call it an architectural masterpiece? I’m not so sure…
Yet that’s exactly what is happening right now as the Royal Institute of British Architects (RIBA) revealed its shortlist for the 2024 London Award.
For this award, the entirety of the Elizabeth Line has been nominated. This means that the rail line has been officially recognised as one of the capital’s best new buildings.
Still, specific stationsalsogot their time to shine, as Abbey Wood, Paddington, Tottenham Court Road and Woolwich stations also made the shortlist as separate RIBA nominees.
But it’s certainly a jarring addition when you consider the fact that its among genuine masterpieces like the revamped National Portrait Gallery and Battersea Power Station’s second phase.
And in case you were wondering, it actually gets even more surprising: the Elizabeth Line seems to have racked up a pretty impressive number of awards in the short time it’s been around.
To date, it has won the LUX Award for Industrial and Transport, a World Architecture Festival Award, a Building Design Award, a Civic Trust Award, a Civic Trust Special Transport + Infrastructure Award.
It’s also been shortlisted for the WAN Urban Design Award and Public Building Architect of the Year at the Building Design Awards.
The line opened in May 2022 at a cost of nearly £19 billion – roughly four years late and four billion over budget.
So, I guess you could say that the Elizabeth Line can be considered architectural royalty.
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But one station served by the Elizabeth Line couldn’t be further from royalty if it tried — and that’s Reading.
London Underground announces new lines
This awards nod isn’t the only TFL news leaving us in a tailspin — Mayor of London Sadiq Khan also announced six new names for the Overground: the Mildmay Line, Suffragette Line, Liberty Line, Lioness Line, Weaver Line, and Windrush Line.
Reportedly, these lines are designed to make the Overground easier to navigate…
According to On Time Trains’ latest rankings, Reading station is ranked as having a ‘dire performance.’ That’s because only 29% of trains run on time there, while nearly one in five of its trains running 10 or more minutes late in the past year. And then 5% of trains didn’t show up at all.
Reading is also served by Great Western Railway, South Western Railway and CrossCountry trains operators.
In the last three months of 2023 alone, the 08:20 service to London Paddington arrived within 10 minutes of the timetable barely 50% of the time.
So it’s not the best area to move to if you’re planning on regularly commuting to work from London.
The RIBA London Awards 2024 shortlist
- Abbey Wood Station by Fereday Pollard Architects
- Artist Studio by VATRAA Architecture
- All Saints by EPR Architects
- Battersea Power Station Phase Two by WilkinsonEyre
- Bradbury Works by [Y/N] Studio
- Brent Cross Town Visitor Pavilion by Moxon Architects
- Bromley Old Town Hall by Cartwright Pickard
- Camden Market Canopy by vPPR Architects for LabTech
- Chowdhury Walk by Al-Jawad Pike
- Cork House by Polysmiths
- Corner Fold House by Whittaker Parsons
- Courtyard Housing by Edward Williams Architects
- Dover Court Estate by Pollard Thomas Edwards
- Dukes Meadow Footbridge by Moxon Architects
- Dulwich House by Proctor & Shaw
- Embassy of the Slovak Republic by BD London
- Ex-Council House Transformation by VATRAA Architecture
- Fish Island Village by Haworth Tompkins, Lyndon Goode Architects, Pitman Tozer Architects and Bureau de Change
- Francis Holland School House by IID Architects
- Hampstead House by Coppin Dockray
- Hendon Waterside Phase 4, Block H1 by Makower Architects
- Highgate House by Emil Eve Architects
- Holland Park Garden House by David Money Architects
- King’s Cross Masterplan by Allies and Morrison and Porphyrios Associates
- Leighton House by BDP
- Love Walk II by Knox Bhavan Architects
- Low Energy House by Architecture for London
- LSBU Hub WilkinsonEyre
- Montacute Yards by Allford Hall Monaghan Morris
- National Portrait Gallery by Jamie Fobert Architects and Purcell
- Oasis Academy Silvertown, by Rivington Street Studio
- Olympic Way & Olympic Steps by Dixon Jones and vPPR Architects
- Orwell House by Bell Phillips
- Oxford Road by Coffey Architects
- Paddington Elizabeth Line Station by Weston Williamson + Partners
- Peckham House by Surman Weston
- Pitzhanger Hub by Jo Townshend Architects
- Rotherhithe Primary School by Feilden Clegg Bradley Studios
- Royal Academy of Dance by Takero Shimazaki Architects
- Sambrook’s Brewery, RAM Quarter by Roger Mears Architects LLP
- Shakespeare Tower by Takero Shimazaki Architects
- Six Columns by 31/44 Architects
- Somerset Road Covered Courts: All England Lawn Tennis Club by Hopkins Architects
- St Andrew’s Holborn by DaeWha Kang Design
- St John’s Waterloo by Eric Parry Architects
- Mary’s Walthamstow by Matthew Lloyd Architects
- Michael’s, Fulwell by Malcolm Fryer Architects
- Sunday Mills by Assael Architecture
- Sycamore House by Jonathan Wilson RIBA
- Taper House by Merrett Houmøller Architects, All & Nxthing & Rosebank Landscaping
- Technique by Buckley Gray Yeoman
- Thames Christian School & Battersea Chapel by Henley Halebrown
- The Africa Centre by Freehaus
- The Arbour by Boehm Lynas Architects and GS8
- The Artists Residence by Gregory Phillips Architects
- The Black & White Building by Waugh Thistleton Architects
- The Department Store Studios by Squire & Partners
- The Elizabeth Line by Grimshaw, Maynard Design, Equation and Atkins
- The Gilbert & George Centre by SIRS Architects
- The Learning Tree Nursery by Delve Architects
- The Parcels Building by Grafton Architects
- The Tannery by Coffey Architects
- The Tree House by Bell Phillips
- The Rowe by Allford Hall Monaghan Morris
- Tori Ann Walk by Al-Jawad Pike
- Tottenham Court Road Elizabeth Line station by Hawkins\Brown
- Unity Place by Feilden Clegg Bradley Studios, Alison Brooks Architects, Gort Scott, RM_A Architects
- Urbanest City by APT London and Hopkins Architects
- Verna, Acton Gardens by GRID Architects and Countryside Partnerships
- White House School by vPPR Architects
- White Patio House by Pashenko Works
- Woolwich Elizabeth Line Station by Weston Williamson + Partners
- 67 Southwark Street by Allies and Morrison
- 10 Lewis Cubitt Square by Allford Hall Monaghan Morris
- 22 Handyside Street by Coffey Architects
- 98-100 De Beauvoir Road by Henley Halebrown
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