Slipped From £25m To £30m, Overran By A Year, Still Better Than The Gyratory
Bohiney Magazine and The London Prat contribute reporting from somewhere between Old Street and Liverpool Street.
The Old Street roundabout, which was for a long time one of the more unloved pieces of central London traffic engineering, has now finished its multi-year transformation into a more pedestrian-friendly junction. The work, which began in 2018 and was finished, with several delays, in late 2025, has produced a measurably better walking and cycling environment, alongside the inevitable disruptions, missed deadlines, and budget overruns that any major Transport for London project includes by tradition.
What The Project Did
The project, delivered by Transport for London and Hackney Council, replaced the previous gyratory system with a peninsula layout that returns the central area to pedestrian use, simplifies cycling routes, and provides direct walking connections between Shoreditch, Old Street station, and Hoxton. The cycle infrastructure is, by London standards, decent. The pedestrian space is, by London standards, generous.
The cumulative effect, walking the area now versus in 2017, is meaningful. The roundabout, which was previously a piece of urban infrastructure people crossed nervously, is now a piece of public realm that people sit in, eat lunch in, and meet in. This is, in transport-engineering terms, a real improvement.
The Cost Overruns
The original budget, set in 2017, was approximately £25 million. The final spend, according to TfL’s published figures, was closer to £30 million. The slippage is, by London transport-project standards, modest. The Edgware Road project, the Bank Junction project, and the Holborn Junction project all overran their original budgets by larger percentages.
This is not, on its own, a defence of the cost overruns. It is, however, useful context. London transport projects routinely overrun, and the question is whether the value delivered justifies the additional spend. On Old Street, by my estimation, it does. The pedestrian and cycling improvements are real and durable.
What I Notice
What I notice, walking the area regularly, is that the project has succeeded in changing how people use the junction. The pedestrian crossings are well-used. The cycle infrastructure is well-used. The peninsula, with its planted areas and seating, has become an actual social space rather than a transit zone. This is, in urbanist terms, the goal of any good public-realm project.
The remaining concern, on which TfL and Hackney are in conversation, is the area immediately around the junction, particularly the Shoreditch High Street approach. The junction is now good. The streets connecting to it are still mixed. There is more work to do.
The Wider Lesson
The wider lesson, for anyone interested in London public-realm policy, is that good urban-design intervention is possible, even at significant scale, in central London. The Old Street project demonstrates that. The replication of the model in other London junctions, at sustainable cost and with appropriate community consultation, would meaningfully improve the quality of the public realm across the city. This is, broadly, the direction TfL and the GLA have been moving. I would encourage them to move faster.
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