Ugly, overcrowded and undermined by dithering over HS2, the unwieldy terminus needs an urgent rethink – or at least a few less digital billboards

Euston Road, which runs along the north edge of London’s ­congestion charge zone, is a strange, compromised mishmash of what should be a grand city avenue. A six-lane thoroughfare crammed with traffic, it is also home to the British Library, the Wellcome Collection and three major railway stations, of which by far the ­ugliest and least loved is the ­terminus that shares its name with the road: Euston.

Euston, to misquote the misquotation of Apollo 13’s message to mission control, has a problem. It is ill-designed, overcrowded and fraught with passenger frustrations. More long-term, no one yet knows whether it is going to be the London terminus of HS2, as was originally planned.