Wednesday 19 Apr 2017
Longer platforms for longer trains: Network Rail completes Egham and Virginia Water platform extensions
- Region & Route:
- Southern: Wessex
- | Southern
Network Rail has completed work to extend platforms at Egham and Virginia Water stations, as part of the £800 million Waterloo & South West Upgrade to increase capacity into Waterloo by 30% by the end of 2018.
Platforms at Egham and Virginia Water have been extended by Network Rail’s engineers to be able to accommodate longer, 10-car trains, which South West Trains will begin operating on the route from May 2017. Existing 10 car trains stopping at Egham will already benefit from the longer platforms.
Network Rail will also be installing lifts in Virginia Water station’s new footbridge in June 2017, to make the station fully-accessible to all passengers.
Becky Lumlock, route managing director at Network Rail, said: “The completion of work at Egham and Virginia Water is further evidence that our Railway Upgrade Plan is delivering a better railway for passengers.
“Extending the platforms at Egham and Virginia Water is a significant step towards completing our enormous £800 million Waterloo & South West Upgrade scheme, which will significantly increase the amount of space for passengers using the railway to and from Waterloo. I’d like to thank passengers for their patience while we’ve upgraded their station.”
Margaret Kay, managing director of South West Trains, said: “We’re looking forward to introducing longer 10-carriage trains this year. These trains will provide more space and extra capacity for our passengers.”
Seiki Payne, project manager at Network Rail, said: “Our teams at Virginia Water and Egham have overcome some real engineering challenges and tricky conditions in order to build the longer platforms, so I’m particularly pleased that we have delivered both schemes on time and on budget. At Egham, the longer platforms mean that trains won’t overhang the level crossing, which will improve waiting times for drivers at the crossing, and at both stations passengers will benefit from better, more comfortable journeys.”
ENDS
Notes to Editors
This is the biggest investment in the railway into Waterloo for decades. It will provide a bigger and better London Waterloo and 30% more space for passengers during the morning and evenings. This will also allow us to provide more space for longer distance passengers in the near future.
Across the network, the Waterloo & South West Upgrade will bring:
- Five more platforms at Waterloo, through the rebuilding of the former Waterloo International Terminal
- Longer platforms for longer trains, at a number of stations on the Reading line.
- 30 brand new trains, providing 150 extra carriages. The trains will run between London Waterloo and Windsor & Eton Riverside, including the Hounslow Loop and Weybridge via Brentford, calling at many of the network’s busiest stations such as Clapham Junction, Vauxhall, Brentford and Twickenham.
- New technology to make trains more efficient and improve punctuality.
- Improvements to depots and maintenance facilities to look after the network’s biggest ever fleet of trains.
August 2017
During August, work will start to extend platforms 1-4 at Waterloo, to allow longer 10-carriage trains to run on Suburban routes. Platforms have already been extended at more than 60 stations on the suburban network but Waterloo is the final, and most complex, station which needs upgrading. Due to the layout of the track and the curve of the neighbouring platforms, to extend platforms 1-4, we also need to carry out the following works, which requires platforms 1-9 to be closed:
- Install new track on the approaches to platforms 1-8.
- Realign and rebuild the far ends of platforms 5-8.
- Provide access for the required machinery to carry out the works.
There will still be some further work to carry out after August 2017, but this will be restricted to weekends. When completed, longer 10-carriage trains will be able to serve suburban routes when the new timetable is introduced from December 2017.
Passengers can check how they will be affected by visiting southwesttrains.co.uk/wswupgrade or by searching online for ‘Waterloo Upgrade’.
Contact information
Passengers / community members
Network Rail national helpline
03457 11 41 41
Latest travel advice
Please visit National Rail Enquiries
Journalists
Network Rail press office - Owen Johns
Media relations manager (Wessex route)
07710 959476
Owen.Johns@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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