ONCE it was home to York’s first railway station, but now the focus is on making West Offices a platform for politics.

The Press has been given the first glimpse behind the scenes at the historic building that will become a new base for City of York Council.

Chosen as the authority’s preferred site following the demise of its original designs on moving to a purpose-built headquarters at Hungate, work has begun by York Investors LLP to revamp the building as part of a £43.8 million project.

The 13,600 square-metre complex on Station Rise will house the council’s main customer centre and create a new home for workers now scattered around 16 different sites.

An historic canopy is being restored over a courtyard area for staff and the George Hudson and George Stephenson boardrooms – named after two of the UK’s rail pioneers – will become a meeting area and a base for a CCTV network respectively.

The building is also intended to be an exemplar of environmentally friendly development, with York Investors – comprised of Buccleuch Property and York-based S Harrison Developments – likely to submit a planning application within a matter of weeks and the project scheduled for completion by the end of 2012.

The work – which will create 40 meeting rooms – has already involved archaeological studies that have unearthed evidence of Roman history and a medieval friary, as well as pieces of old platform infrastructure.

“It’s very exciting because we have a brief to create a purpose-built HQ which satisfies the council’s needs, but it’s also a challenge,” said Chris Hale, S Harrison’s group design manager.

“However, we believe we are meeting that challenge in terms of preserving the site and bringing it back into life. One of the architects involved in the project so far said that to make a really good omelette, you have to break a few eggs, but we feel we are breaking very few eggs in what we are doing.

“We have ensured we understand the history of the site and recorded anything which may be of interest, so we don’t find any architecture which we didn’t expect to find and which may delay the development. We are confident this will be a development of which the city can be proud.”

• More information about the new HQ can be found at westoffices.co.uk

Fact file

THE history of West Offices dates to the Roman era, but the building first assumed a prominent role in the city during medieval times when it was the site of the King’s House and the Royal Free Chapel of St Mary Magdalene.

In 1227, the chapel and the land on which it stood was granted to the Dominican Friars by Henry III, but the friary was dissolved in 1583.

The York and North Midland Railway Company chose the site as the location for York’s railway station in 1838, buying it from York Corporation for £5,000. The company’s chairman, George Hudson, wanted the transport link within the walls of the city, putting him at odds with Robert Stephenson’s suggestion that it should be built outside the walls.

York-based architect GT Andrews designed the station and work began in 1840, being completed the following year and officially opened on March 30 – at a cost of about £8,000 – with the inauguration of the Great North Eastern passenger service to Darlington.

After Queen Victoria’s visit in September 1853, it became known as the Royal Station Hotel, and further improvements were made to the building throughout the 1850s and 1860s. But in 1877, the new – and present – York Station was built and West Offices subsequently became the headquarters of the North Eastern Railway.

The shadow of potential demolition hung over the property for a time, but the plans were never put into effect and it continued to be used as railway offices.