The team led by Sener with RSHP and Valencia-based ERRE has been selected to design the new Valencia Central Station. The scheme is ambitious because it is not simply a new station building: it is an urban infrastructure project intended to reorganise rail movement through the city while preserving and reconnecting one of Valencia’s most important historic transport landmarks.

Why this project matters

The winning concept turns the future station into an underground intermodal hub. High-speed rail, commuter services, metro, tram, buses, taxis, cycling and walking routes are intended to meet within one coordinated system. The proposal also connects the new infrastructure with the planned Central Park, the Access Canal project and the future through tunnel.

That through-running strategy is a major shift from a terminal model. Trains will be able to move north–south through Valencia rather than arrive, reverse and depart in the opposite direction. For passengers, the most important design question will be whether all this complexity feels simple once they enter the station.

Historic preservation is part of the brief

Valencia Nord Station is a designated Site of Cultural Interest, and the proposal keeps its existing façades while integrating the historic building into the new urban composition. This is exactly the kind of infrastructure problem that defines contemporary European architecture: expand capacity dramatically without erasing the architectural memory of the city.

The project therefore has to operate on two levels. Below ground it must perform like high-capacity transport infrastructure. Above ground it must repair urban connections, create useful public space and allow the existing station to retain dignity rather than becoming an isolated monument.

A station square, landscape axis and Central Park connection

The landscape strategy links the new Central Station, Valencia Nord and the future Central Park through pedestrian and cycling routes. These converge at a proposed Station Square, turning the station entrance into civic space rather than merely a forecourt for taxis and drop-offs.

This is a strong move because large stations increasingly function like pieces of city rather than standalone buildings. Their public spaces carry commuters, visitors, retail, waiting, events and everyday pedestrian life. When designed well, the square outside can matter as much as the ticket hall inside.

Natural light in an underground station

The design team intends to bring daylight and fresh air down into the underground levels, including the platforms. Open spaces visually connect different levels, which can make navigation easier and reduce the claustrophobic feeling common to buried transport infrastructure.

This is also where the architecture will be judged most critically. Large concourses often look elegant in competition imagery but become dominated by signs, security equipment, retail fit-outs and service systems. The success of Valencia Central Station will depend on whether the original spatial clarity survives real operation.

Modular construction and keeping trains running

The proposal uses a modular construction strategy with a high degree of prefabrication and is designed around maintaining railway operations throughout the build. That is not a glamorous headline, but it is essential. The best transport architecture is often defined by how intelligently construction, safety and passenger movement are solved while the city continues to function around it.

What designers should watch next

Three aspects deserve attention as the project develops: the timber-roof language shown in concept imagery, the relationship between old and new station structures, and the way daylight is delivered to below-ground platforms. If all three are resolved coherently, Valencia could gain a transport hub that feels less like infrastructure inserted into the city and more like a new urban district growing from it.

The Luxe Journal takeaway

The significance of the Valencia project is not one dramatic façade. It is the attempt to combine mobility, heritage, landscape and carbon-conscious construction in one enormous piece of public architecture. That is precisely where the most interesting station design is heading.

Source: ArchDaily, September 18, 2026.