Marble Arch Mound: Attraction to stay permanently free

A viewing platform described as "London's worst tourist attraction" will remain free to climb until it closes in January 2022.

The man-made Marble Arch mound was commissioned by Westminster City Council and cost about £6m, nearly double its forecast of £3.3m.

Tickets had been priced between £4.50 and £8, but after the plants started to die the entrance fee was dropped.

Organisers had expected 200,000 ticketholders to flock to the hill.

The deputy leader of Westminster council, who was responsible for the project, resigned after the cost escalated.

Visitors had labelled it a "slag heap" and dubbed the mound "London's worst tourist attraction," the Local Democracy Reporting Service (LDRS) said.

Frequent gripes were that the hill was not high enough to see over trees in nearby Hyde Park, rendering obsolete the "viewing" platform, and that the plants and grass were straggly and patchy.

But more positive reviews were forthcoming when the entrance fee was scrapped.

Executions were held at the location for almost 600 years, when the area was known as Tyburn. Oliver Cromwell, though he was already dead, was exhumed and symbolically hung from the Tyburn Tree [gallows].