Crossrail 2 Consultation – October 2015
This is the latest Crossrail 2 Consultation from the TfL web site.
I will be extracting relevant information piece-by-piece from the consultation documents.
This is a list of my extracts.
- Angel Station
- Dalston Station
- King’s Road Chelsea Station
- Managing Excavated Materials
- New Southgate Station
- Shoreditch Park Area
- Tooting Broadway Or Balham
- Tunnels, Shafts And Head-Houses
- Wimbledon Station
I shall be starting with ones that are relevant to where I live in Dalston.
These are links to various Crossrail 2 documents I’ve used as sources.
This page is Crossrail 2’s index.
Crossrail 2 October 2015 – Shoreditch Park Area
This is Crossrail 2’s map of their possible worksites in the Shoreditch Park area. It comes from this Crossrail 2 document entitled Crossrail 2 Shafts.
Crossrail 2 Shoreditch Park
Note that the Worksites are labelled A to E.
To show them in more detail, this is a Google Map of the same area.
A Google Map Of The Area
Crossrail 2 have said this about the choice of work site.
A single worksite would be required to build and equip the shaft and the junction.
We are currently considering a number of options for the shaft in the area. Our current options have been selected because they would allow us to position the possible ‘Eastern Branch’ junction under the open space of Shoreditch Park.
Bear in mind that Crossrail 2 tunnels will be twenty or so metres down, so positioning the junction, which could be noisy, as trains rattle over the points, under a park some fifty metres and more from any dwellings, could be a good idea. Crossrail 2 wouldn’t want a repeat of the Victoria Line noise problems at Walthamstow
If we assume that one work site is what they’d like to do, I don’t feel that they would use more than two. The sites are as follows.
- Sites A and B to the West are commercial storage.
- Site C is the North-West corner of the Park
- Sites D and E are in the Britannia Leisure Centre.
The sites D and E are on the Hackney branch of the line, so unless that line is built in Phase 1, I doubt that they will be used.
If they are, knocking down and rebuilding leisure centres or commercial premises is a lot less costly and inconvenient, than demolishing houses or flats.
I don’t know what Crossrail 2 will do, but I visited the Crossrail site at Stepney City Farm, which is over a massive junction on Crossrail, so is very similar to Shoreditch Park.
I found a very good relationship existing between all parties. There certainly hasn’t been any bad reports about the Stepney City Farm site on the web.
This report is from the East London Advertiser.
Crossrail 2 will cause themselves a lot of problems, if they don’t do as well as Crossrail!
I took these pictures as I walked from the Britannia Leisure Centre through Shoreditch Park to Eagle Wharf Road. At the end of Eagle Wharf Road, I crossed the Regent’s Canal and looked at the building in Eagle Wharf Road from the towpath.
I can’t see any obvious reason, why the Leisure Centre would be used for Crossrail 2, as neither of the commercial buildings in Eagle Wharf Road are of the finest quality and given Crossrail’s treatment of Mile End Park, there would appear no reason the corner of the Park can’t be used.
One of the great advantages of the Park, would be that if you need to bring in some really heavy equipment, you’d just remove the iron railings and roll it through the gap.
Under current plans, there would appear to be no reason to extract or insert a tunnel boring machine in the Shoreditch area.
But choosing the Park would allow this to be done if required.
There is also the problem of a head-house.
It might be difficult to provide one in the Park, but evacuating into a large park from a problem in the tunel might be very safe.
Head houses on the sites in Eagle Wharf Road could even be built into any new buildings on the site.
Architecture and engineering design is moving on apace and who knows what will be possible when Crossrail 2 is built?
Crossrail 2 Changes Its Mind!
This map from the Crossrail 2 web site, show the new route for Crossrail 2.
Crossrail 2 Route – Autumn 2015
So what are the changes and how do I think they stack up?
Broxbourne Instead Of Hertford East
Broxbourne station is the first, where traffic from Bishop’s Stortford, Cambridge, Hertford East and Stansted Airport all come together.
So perhaps by making Broxbourne a station, where passengers from Cambridge or Stansted can change across a platform for Crossrail 2 and all its destination in Central and South West London is a good idea.
As someone, who lived for nearly thirty years near Cambridge, it would certainly have pleased me.
This Google Map of Broxbourne station explains a lot.
Broxbourne Station
Note that Broxbourne station is now a four platform station sitting on a large site. For comparison purposes this is a Google Map of Hertford East station.
Hertford East Station
It is a much more cramped site compared to Broxbourne. The other stations on the branch would need substantial upgrading.
- Ware is a one platform station with an adjoining level-crossing.
- St. Margaret’s is a small station with a level-crossing.
- Rye House is a small station on another cramped site.
I suspect that operating an intensive service over the level crossings and the partly single-track branch was considered a serious obstacle to using Hertford East as a terminus of Crossrail 2.
There are other possible reasons.
- There is lots of space at Broxbourne for car parking and a proper bus interchange.
- As it now looks that the West Anglia Main Line will be four-tracked for a lot of its route, could cross-platform interchange be provided between the fast services from Cambridge, Stansted and the North and Crossrail 2, at Broxbourne.
- The space at Broxbourne would allow some extra platforms to be created.
- Broxbourne may well be a better interchange between fast services and Crossrail 2 than Tottenham Hale, which is another station on a cramped site.
Broxbourne has so much more potential for extra services than Hertford East.
The Future Of The Hertford East Branch
The Hertford East branch may turn out to be just a branch after Crossrail 2 is built.
If for instance, the West Anglia Main Line was to be three- or four-tracked as far as the Hertford East branch,then Hertford East services could have their own dedicated tracks to Broxbourne, just as the East London Line does to Highbury and Islington station.
This gives a service with the following characteristics and advantages.
- Generally Hertford East services are self-contained and could be mainly a two, three or four trains an hour shuttle, with possibly extra services to and from Liverpool Street in the peak.
- The frequency is probably limited by the level crossings on the branch.
- Hertford East services could probably be arranged, so they didn’t have to cross the West Anglia Main Line, which could remove a capacity restraint on the main line.
- Passengers would change at Broxbourne to and from fast services to Liverpool Street and Crossrail 2
- Would a separated branch give scope for some clever platform arrangements at Broxbourne?
- Would a separated branch free up paths into a very crowded Liverpool Street?
I think it is true to say, that if the level crossings and single-track sections on the branch could be removed, this would allow a much better service to Hertford East.
Turnpike Lane And Alexandra Palace Or Wood Green?
In the original plan, where Crossrail 2 passed through Turnpike Lane And Alexandra Palace stations, this gave possible interchanges to the following lines.
If the only station in that area is Wood Green, Crossrail 2 loses the connection to the Hertford Loop Line, which was at Alexandra Palace.
By 2019, the Hertford Loop Line will have good connectivity to the following lines.
- Piccadilly Line at Finsbury Park
- Victoria Line at Finsbury Park and Highbury and Islington
- Thameslink at any station between Alexandra Palace and Finsbury Park
- Crossrail at Moorgate
- Harringay could be linked to Harringay Green Lanes on the Gospel Oak and Barking Line.
- North and East London Lines at Highbury and Islington.
Some of these links will probably be better than they are now by 2019, due to upgrading at Finsbury Park and Highbury and Islington stations.
So I suspect that building two stations instead of one for Crossrail 2 in the Wood Green area was not considered good value for money.
Crossrail 2 have produced a detailed document about their route through the area.
Kings Road Chelsea
The contentious Kings Road Chelsea station has moved slightly, but those who think they are above the plebs still seem to be against the new station.
For a bit of sense, you can always read this report on Crossrail 2 from the local council. I particularly liked this extract on station size.
A King’s Road Crossrail station would not be “five times the size of Peter Jones” or as big as the “Westfield shopping Centre” as some have claimed. Kensington and Chelsea would remain the planning authority for the station development and the station would therefore have to be in keeping with the traditional scale and character of this part of the King’s Road. –
Or they could read up about that other difficult to design station; Camden Town, which I described in The Camden Town Station Upgrade Exhibition.
Good design there,seems to have sent the Nimbys back to their caves.
Tooting Broadway Or Balham?
Both Tooting Broadway and Balham stations are on the Northern Line, but I think Balham is being preferred as it is also a busy main line station.
As some of the main line services through Balham, are duplicated by Crossrail 2, the new line now offers opportunities to release the pressure off the lines through Balham.
If you look at a map of the railway lines in the area, it may be that Crossrail 2 will send the new tunnels in a wide circle from Balham to Wimbledon under Tooting and Haydons Road stations, so that the tunnels are dug totally under existing railway land.
Using Balham rather than Tooting Broadway seems a good idea.
Crossrail 2 Shafts
Crossrail 2 have also published a list of where their shafts will be.
- Downhills Recreation Ground
- Stamford Hill area
- Shoreditch Park area
- Victoria Coach station – According to Wikipedia, the freeholder want to redevelop this site and relocate the coach station.
- Westbridge Road
- Wandsworth Common
- Springfield
- Weir Road
I shall update this as I find out more.
The Revival Of Sleeper Services In The UK
I like sleeper trains and have used them three times in recent years.
The Deutsche Bahn sleeper between Munich and Paris, had one big disadvantage compared to the two Scottish trips – Customer service was not up to the standard First Class passengers expect and get on the Caledonian Sleeper.
The biggest problem, was that there was no waiting facilities at Munich station, as everything closed a couple of hours before the train left.
The last trip I did down from Scotland was during the Commonwealth Games and after an evening session, I couldn’t find a hotel room in Glasgow. I got a First Class sleeper cabin all to myself for just over a hundred pounds, so it was probably cheaper than getting a room in the city and coming down by train in the morning.
Every time, I go North of the Border in future, I’ll always look into the possibility of taking a sleeper down after my visit.
In the UK, sleeper trains seem to be having a revival with both the Caledonian Sleeper and Night Riviera going through a process of upgrading with either new or refurbished carriages.
But in Europe, they seem to be declining.
I wonder what Nigel F***** would make of that one!
We certainly have a different attitude to railways in this country.
Stations For Inclined Lifts
After the superb installation at Greenford, I wonder if stations like these will get inclined lifts in their third space.
It would probably be dependent on the layout of the stations, but we’ll certainly see more.
Highbury and Islington station might be able to have a central inclined lift, but then to get to the platforms, there are further difficult stairs. If ever a station was built that would be difficult to provide step-free access, it is this one.
The Anonymous Widower 