On the upper level, above the Arcade concourse, stands a bronze statue of the former Poet Laureate Sir John Betjeman, gazing in apparent wonder at the Barlow roof. Designed by British sculptor Martin Jennings, the statue commemorates the poet’s successful campaign to save the station from demolition in the 1960s.[28][29] The 2-metre (6 ft 7 in)-high statue stands on a flat disc of Cumbrian slate inscribed with lines from Betjeman’s poem Cornish Cliffs:
And in the shadowless unclouded glare / Deep blue above us fades to whiteness where / A misty sea-line meets the wash of air.—John Betjeman, Cornish Cliffs, [30]
