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Monday 27 Feb 2017

Video: See the incredible progress made so far this year at London Bridge as the team prepares for significant engineering work throughout 2017

Region & Route:

| Southern

Passengers given a glimpse behind the hoardings at London Bridge as the station team gears up for engineering work this Easter.

The station’s £1bn redevelopment, part of the Thameslink Programme, is currently in its final phase ahead of completion in 2018.This will mean closures and changes to services over Easter, both May bank holidays, August and December, as Network Rail continues to rebuild London Bridge and the surrounding railway.

Since January, great progress has been made on the final section of the new, street-level concourse, which will open in January 2018. The foundations are being formed for the station façade and the lifts, stairs and escalators have been installed. The team has also been busy assembling the pre-cast bridge decks that will support platforms 1, 2 and 3, and building the steelwork sections that will form the canopies above.

This is in preparation for Easter, when the orange army will be bringing into use the tracks through platforms 1 and 2 at London Bridge and carrying out track and signalling work in the surrounding area. There will be no Southeastern trains to or from Charing Cross, Waterloo East and London Bridge on Friday 14 and Saturday 15 April and no trains to or from Cannon Street between Friday 14 and Monday 17 April inclusive. There will also be no Southeastern trains at Deptford, Greenwich, Maze Hill or Westcombe Park over the four day weekend; passengers wishing to attend Tall Ships Royal Greenwich 2017 should be aware of alternative options.

Andrew Hutton, Network Rail’s lead development manager for London Bridge station said: “As the redevelopment of London Bridge by the Thameslink Programme leaps towards completion, I would like to thank passengers for their patience. We understand that it has been tough and urge passengers to plan ahead throughout 2017, while we work round-the-clock on our Railway Upgrade Plan to improve journeys to and through London for the millions of passengers that use the UK’s busiest stretch of railway each year.”

Ellie Burrows, Train Services Director at Southeastern said: “The work being done at London Bridge has been, and continues to be, hard on our passengers, but we are confident it will be worth it. The new station will improve the experience and journey for our passengers and we cannot wait for them to see the benefits in 2018. We thank our passengers for their continued patience and urge them to plan ahead and to make alternative arrangements during the planned engineering work happening during Easter and the May bank holidays, and during August and December, when working days will be significantly affected by closures.”

Passengers are advised to look ahead to August and Christmas 2017 when significant engineering work will take place at and around London Bridge, including on working days.

In August, significant work will take place over the bank holiday and the four working days after. There will be no Southeastern services at London Bridge, Waterloo East and Charing Cross for 8 days. Those trains that do run will be diverted to alternative London stations and will be extremely busy, with queuing systems in place.

There will be further big changes happening at Christmas, with no trains at a number of London stations between Saturday 23 December 2017 and Tuesday 2 January 2018. Journeys will be significantly affected and passengers are advised to look ahead and consider their plan B in advance.

More information and travel advice will be available closer to the time.

ENDS

About Thameslink Programme

The Thameslink Programme is transforming north-south travel through London. When complete in 2018 it will give passengers:

• New longer and more spacious trains running every 2 to 3 minutes through central London in the peak
• Improved connections and better options to more destinations on an expanded Thameslink network including Cambridge and Peterborough
• More robust tracks and state-of-the art signalling and more reliable trains to make journeys more reliable
• Completely rebuilt stations at Blackfriars and London Bridge 

London Bridge facts

• Over 120 million people a year go to London Bridge or through it to Cannon Street and Charing Cross – around 50 million start or end their at London Bridge itself
• The new concourse at London Bridge will be bigger than the pitch at Wembley, increasing passenger capacity by 65%
• London Bridge will be longer than the Shard is tall
• From 2018, more frequent services:
• Between Blackfriars and St Pancras - up to 24 trains per hour in each direction during the peak
• Between London Bridge and St Pancras - up to 18 Thameslink trains an hour in each direction, during the peak
• 180 years old – London Bridge is London’s oldest surviving rail terminus, first opened in Dec 1836