Gammel Strand
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the official site for the city Metro has news, general information, drawings and a short description of the new stations along with pdf plans of the area around each station at street level
Work is moving forward fast on the hard landscaping at street level above the new metro station at Gammel Strand … a station on the new circle line that will open later in the summer.
The steps down to the platforms and the glass covered lift tower are in place and setts are now being laid in the traditional scallop pattern across the main area so the new arrangement for this important historic street is becoming clear.
There was consultation with local businesses and local residents. Vehicles will be excluded, apart from deliveries, so the only through traffic will be a new narrow bike lane but with markings showing lanes to cycle in both directions.
The existing road, now being removed, runs parallel to the building frontages with just a narrow pavement so with little space for outside tables and chairs for the restaurants here. With the bike lane set forward closer to and parallel to the canal there should be much more space for people to sit outside and the gentle curve of the bike lane takes that bike traffic along the side of the canal further west rather than running as the road does now through in a straight line to Snaregade.
There will be steps down from the street level of Gammel Strand to a lower canal-side level for access to boats but as a sun trap it will certainly be used by people simply wanting to sit and watch what is happening on the water.
The work at street level around each station is crucial. People will quickly get used to the new arrangements of steps and paved areas and new road alignments and, inevitably, find it difficult to remember what each area looked like before …. particularly as the disruption of major engineering work has meant temporary arrangements and high hoardings around many parts of the city for many years.
The precise arrangement of steps and lifts and the crucial bike stands will be important not just for how each station deals with the numbers of passengers each day - estimates suggest that 18,000 passengers a day will use Gammel Strand - but the planning will determine the way people use the area immediately around each station.
Here at Gammel Strand, many using the Metro will be heading to or coming from the parliament buildings at Christiansborg on the other side of the canal so the steps up and down from the east end of the platform are double width. It seems that, in part to respect the historic quay side, and reduce the impact of the new station superstructure, Gammel Strand will not have skylights found on most of the existing stations to throw light down, between the escalators, to bring as much natural light to the platform as possible.
Gammel Strand was a commercial quay backed by warehouses and merchants’ houses but for many years it was also the fish market until it was moved out south down the harbour to Fisketorvet.
