It serves as the main railway terminal for the state under Keretapi Tanah Melayu offering KTM ETS services, as well as handling freight trains.

Other places like Birch Memorial Clock Tower, Padang Ipoh, Tun Razak Library and State Mosque are also located nearby.

In spite of its overall aesthetics, elements of Indo-Saracenic architecture are still found in the form of miniature chhatris towering over corner support columns on both sides of the structure.

For much of its early history the square is a lawn sparsely lined with trees; a garden park was eventually built over the site over the course of the 1970s and 1980s, incorporating heavier vegetation, tiled and paved pathways, and a plaza containing sculptures and fountains.

The cenotaph has subsequently been modified with new plaques to honor fallen soldiers from Perak in World War II, the Malayan Emergency, the Indonesian confrontation and the "Re-insurgency Period".

A more recent addition is a memorial plaque that pays tribute to combatant and non-combatant prisoners of war who died building the Thailand–Burma Railway.

Following the snapping of the 1980 tree during a windstorm on 28 April 2017, a new Ipoh sapling was replanted on 21 February 2018 with Menteri Besar Zambry Abdul Kadir in attendance.