New footbridge opens to public making crossing the railway into the Lea Valley safer

Friday 8 Jun 2018

New footbridge opens to public making crossing the railway into the Lea Valley safer

Region & Route:: Eastern: Anglia; | Eastern

Pedestrians and cyclists who cross the railway at Slipe Lane, Broxbourne, are able to do so more safely as a new footbridge opened today (Friday 8 June) as part of a £4m Network Rail project.

Work to install the bridge started in November last year and the main span of the footbridge, stairs and ramps were constructed in January 2018.

The pedestrian level crossing at Slipe Lane is now closed and the footbridge provides a safer route to cross the railway.

Last year, there were 25 near misses at the crossing which is used by around 80 people every day, and where 378 trains pass at up to 80mph, making it one of the riskiest in the region.

Meliha Duymaz, Network Rail’s route managing director for Anglia, said: “We’ve seen a number of near misses and incidents at this level crossing which encouraged our decision to close it and offer a safer alternative. Level crossings remain one of the biggest risks to public safety on the railway and we are committed to closing them wherever possible to improve safety as part of our Railway Upgrade Plan."

For more information on level crossing safety visit www.networkrail.co.uk/levelcrossings.

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 - Katie Mack
Media relations manager (Anglia route)
0330 8577 132
Katie.Mack@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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