Tuesday 19 Jan 2010
ACCESS FOR ALL AT HORLEY STATION
- Region & Route:
- | Southern
Construction work has started at Horley station to provide passengers with step-free access between the station entrance and the platforms as part of a multi-million pound national scheme to make the railway more accessible for everyone.
The £1.8m project will include the installation of three new lifts onto the existing footbridge and tactile paving.
The new facilities at Horley station, which is the start or end for over a million journeys every year, are expected to be completed by autumn 2010.
Fiona Taylor, Network Rail’s route director for Sussex, said: “The railway provides passengers in Horley with a key transport link into London. It’s important to provide facilities which make the railway easier to use, safer and more accessible for everyone, including people with reduced mobility and those with heavy luggage or small children. We’re pleased this funding has made it possible for us to carry out these station improvements and we look forward to completing this work with the minimum of disruption to passengers.”
Southern’s commercial director, Alex Foulds said: “This work is much needed at the station and we are particularly pleased as it closes the circle at Horley which already has superb transport interchange facilities. We are delighted that work is to start on this important project which will make even more of the railway accessible to everyone.”
Network Rail is managing and delivering the improvements, which are being funded by the Department for Transport’s (DfT) £370m Access for All fund.
Notes to editors
Other stations in the Southern area that have already benefited from Access for All improvements are Balham, Purley and Oxted. Work is already underway at Clapham Junction, Forest Hill, Streatham Common, Streatham Hill, and Three Bridges, while improvements are also planned for Brockley, Dorking, Hassocks, New Cross Gate and Thornton Heath.
About Access for All
Access for All is a £370m ring-fenced fund for station accessibility improvements under the government’s ten-year Railways for All strategy. Station selection and prioritisation is made by the DfT. To date, 145 stations in England, Wales and Scotland have been selected to receive step-free access improvements.
Contact information
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southeastroutecomms@networkrail.co.uk
About Network Rail
We own, operate and develop Britain's railway infrastructure; that's 20,000 miles of track, 30,000 bridges, tunnels and viaducts and the thousands of signals, level crossings and stations. We run 20 of the UK's largest stations while all the others, over 2,500, are run by the country's train operating companies.
Usually, there are almost five million journeys made in the UK and over 600 freight trains run on the network. People depend on Britain's railway for their daily commute, to visit friends and loved ones and to get them home safe every day. Our role is to deliver a safe and reliable railway, so we carefully manage and deliver thousands of projects every year that form part of the multi-billion pound Railway Upgrade Plan, to grow and expand the nation's railway network to respond to the tremendous growth and demand the railway has experienced - a doubling of passenger journeys over the past 20 years.
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