It takes two

The background
The UK’s largest engineering and design consultancy, Atkins, was commissioned by The Crown Estate (working in partnership with Westminster City Council, and Transport for London) to plan and design the Piccadilly Two-Way Scheme.

The Two-Way scheme aimed to convert the existing one-way working of Pall Mall, St James’s Street and Piccadilly to two-way traffic with significant improvements throughout the area. The new design was aimed to provide traffic with more routes in this part of London and create a more user friendly, clutter free and accessible environment for all road users.

The crucial issue when beginning to put design into practice was to ensure that the concept design gained the support and buy-in from local government and could progress successfully beyond the planning stage. Atkins needed to illustrate its proposal in a real world context in order to demonstrate what the proposed improved footways and rationalisation to streets would actually look like. Making it far easier for any planning or design committee to easily visualise the future plans.

Not-so simple solutions
After much consultation, it was decided that Skape, a 3D city mapping online service provided by Astrium Services, would be the best solution to ensure the Piccadilly Two-Way Scheme project could be shown in another light. Furthermore, the mapping service allowed the score of environmental benefits to be effectively communicated to all stakeholders associated with the entire project.

Astrium provided Atkins with Real Skape 3D city model of central London. These fully rendered models allowed Atkins to turn their vision and concept into an actual reality. The package enabled local authority officers and the local community (the people who would most benefit) to relate to and support the project.

The models created by Skape, where fully textured with a high level of detail which allowed stakeholders and those working closely with the project to actually view the development in a real-world 3D environment, demonstrating the true benefits of the scheme. Furthermore, Skape’s 3D models of the area where pre-built which meant that they were instantly available, saving Atkins valuable time in the drawn-out consultation process.

The 3D images detailed a raft of things, most notably:
- A redirection of roads to deliver a two-way traffic operation and better signal arrangements at Piccadilly Circus and the Piccadilly / St James’s Street junction in order to minimise delays for cars, buses, taxis and deliveries to businesses
- More footway space, better pedestrian crossing arrangements and the removal of guard railing at Piccadilly Circus and along the Piccadilly area
- Street lighting placed on existing and new central islands along Pall Mall and Piccadilly to create needed boulevards
- The removal of general clutter on footways to make the area, particularly Piccadilly, Pall Mall, St James’s Street and Piccadilly Circus a more attractive place to visit and be in.

Conclusions
Ultimately, with the project past the planning stages the future signs are good. Techniques like 3D mapping will undoubtedly be used increasingly more and the future potential for the technique is endless.  Peter Bourne, development manager at Crown Estate said: “We have found that using high quality animations are a powerful tool in getting support for schemes in sensitive high profile locations. The Skape 3D city mapping service provides a high quality, ready to use and economical solution.”