The basic reason for the scale of Barlow's design is that he was required to have a sheltered enclosure raised 6 metres from the surrounding streets and enough space on the end to erect a huge hotel building, with a tunnel running under the site, and streets enclosing the sides preventing it from being built out more.
The structural grid has columns set 4.26 metres apart and is based on the Bass Beer Warehouse in Burton on Trent which used this number as it was derived from a certain amount of local sized beer barrels.
The 800 cast-iron columns were chosen over brick piers which most railway stations featured at the time in order to maximise internal space.
Structural horizontal girders were buried under the platforms to reduce their expansion and contraction with varying tempertures and make the structural planning of the building a much simpler task for the engineers. What remaining expansion and contraction there is is easily absorbed by the roof arches.
A single span roof was chosen to avoid a "valley" between two stretches of roof that could accumulate excessive water when it rained. The architect used as a justification to the developers it would be £1 per square yard cheaper.
The 25 arches enclosed an original structure 210 metres long, and 74.8 metres wide, with the entrance arch originally peaking at 31 metres above the train tracks.
Barlow originally included an undercroft in his design which could be commercially exploited by the York and Midland Railway as a beer cellar. The existence of this allowed the 2007 rebuild to have the station reconstructed on two levels.
2007 saw not only the full renovation of the existing terminus, but also a separate new station structure completed on the end of the original Barlow train shed that is structurally distinct and not included in the above figures but extends the two train sheds to a combined length of about 450 metres.
Companies
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