My blog post on the way home last night was possibly a bit too telegraphic even by my standards.

The event was extremely interesting and I thought completely persuasive.

First, there were two presentations on the last very clever and historically sensitive upgrade of the station during the 1980s when Simon Jenkins was a member of the British Rail Board. It was done by Nick Derbyshire who at the time was head of British Rail’s Architecture and Design Group (ADG). He extended the train sheds to cover the concourse and reconstructed the Victorian romanesque building immediately to the east of the Great Eastern Hotel. So, it is clear that it is perfectly possible to protect the original Victorian character of the station while at the same time modernising it.

John McAslan’s scheme is clever in that it accepts the need for new offices as required by the brief from Network Rail, but then provides a solution which is entirely in the spirit of the original train sheds, a piece of modern engineering, designed in partnership with Chris Wise, equivalent to the way they upgraded King’s Cross so successfully.

The current scheme by Acme which is vast and totally insensitive goes to the City’s planning committee in either February or March. They apparently approve 98% of schemes presented to them as compared to Maldon which only approves 40%.

So, the issue is: are the members of the City’s planning committee going to pay attention that there could be a better, more interesting and more ecological alternative scheme as designed by John McAslan ?

Could the board of Network Rail be encouraged to look at the alternative, not least its costing ?

As has been demonstrated at the Custom House, the City’s planning committee can on occasion come up with an alternative and better way forward which protects the character of the City while still allowing good quality new development. They should do the same at Liverpool Street.