Great Russell Street – Holborn Liveable Neighbourhood STARter Project

Overview

Proposed improvements to: Walking, wheeling, road safety and the look and the feel of the street.   

We want to transform Holborn into a place for people with attractive, healthy, accessible and safe streets for everyone. We want the air you’re breathing to be cleaner, for there to be more plants and trees, in beautiful new and improved spaces. We want to make getting around by sustainable and healthy types of transport easier and faster. Together, we want to see Holborn and its communities, businesses and visitors thrive. 

Great Russell Street is one of Holborn Liveable Neighbourhood area major projects, and there are longer term ambitions to transform the area outside the British Museum by pedestrianising it in the future. These proposals are currently still in development, and we will be consulting on them separately next year.  

In the meantime, we are proposing some smaller changes on Great Russell Street that are easier to deliver but could have a big impact, as one of our Holborn Liveable Neighbourhood  STARter projects - improvements that we think can be delivered now, ahead of the wider project. The Holborn Liveable Neighbourhood area has been identified in the Camden Transport Strategy (CTS) Delivery Plan as an area of very high priority in terms of addressing road safety. 

Why your views matter

Your views matter to improve Great Russell Street and the surrounding area to help people walk, wheel, cycle or scoot safely while also boosting the attractiveness and sense of welcome to the street.  

To view the plans and to find out more about what the proposal would achieve, click on the links in the Related Section at the bottom of this page. 

Our proposals include: 

• Great Russell Street junction with Museum St. – Introduce an uncontrolled crossing over Museum Street to improve pedestrian priority. An uncontrolled pedestrian crossing is a place where people can cross the road without traffic lights or signals, meaning pedestrians must check for approaching vehicles and wait until it is safe to cross. You can see an example of an uncontrolled crossing in the photo guide in the related documents section below.    
• Great Russell Street junction with Willoughby St. - Introduce a new continuous pavement over Willoughby St. A continuous pavement is where the pavement continues across the entrance of a side road at the same level and with the same surface material, giving pedestrians more priority and encouraging drivers to give way. You can see an example of a continuous pavement in the photo guide in the related documents section below.   
• Widening a section of pavement on the northern side of Great Russell Street (to the east of British Museum main entrance) to create a more pleasant environment for pedestrians. This will replace four paid-for parking bays (23.1m).
• Re-location of the on-pavement Dockless Bike Hire Bay from the southern end of Montague Street, at the junction with Great Russell Street to Bedford Place to increase space for pedestrians on key walking route from Russell Square to British Museum. The new Dockless Bike Hire Bay will replace 7.5m length of single yellow line. 
• 12.1m length of single yellow line replaced with 12.1m length of double yellow line at the southern end of Bedford Place to improve pedestrian sightlines at junction. 
• Adding cycle stands on Montague Street and Great Russell Street to provide short stay visitor cycle storage on the street. 
• Adding seating at strategic locations along Great Russell Street to provide spaces to rest for all users of the street.  

We are also seeking your ideas for how the seating on Great Russell Street should look. The seating could be designed to include artwork, lighting, directions signs to help you get around and made to adapt to different users.  

To view the plans and find out more about what each proposal would achieve, click on the links in the Related Section at the bottom of this page.