DEMOLITION STARTS ON NEXT PHASE OF THAMESLINK WORK
Published at 23:48 on Wednesday 17th June 2015
Tags: Bermondsey, Thameslink, Network Rail, London Bridge
An aerial view of the work taking place, showing the viaduct sections that will be demolished as part of the project Network Rail
Demolition has begun at the site of one of the £6.5 billion Thameslink Programme’s most crucial improvements that was once a tangle of railways and roads.
The massive Bermondsey Dive Under is being created to separate flows of trains approaching London Bridge from South East London, Croydon and Kent, improving reliability and reducing delays, and in order to create the Dive Under (the opposite of a motorway flyover), several stretches of old viaduct and bridges are being removed.
Project Manager, Greg Thornett, said: “Our Victorian ancestors did a fantastic job, and we are still using much of their work to carry more than 200,000 passengers every day, including a stretch of the oldest railway in the whole of London. However, this is a once-in-a-lifetime opportunity for us to untangle the current complex track layout, which is a result of historic railway operators dating back over 150 years running services adjacent to one another into London on their own infrastructure. Our contractors are removing the steel bridges first, before using a mixture of techniques to deconstruct the brick viaducts. Passengers will soon see big changes from the windows of their trains.”
The Thameslink Programme is rebuilding much of the railway from New Cross Gate through London Bridge and on to Blackfriars and St Pancras. The Bermondsey Dive Under will involve two Victorian viaducts being partially demolished and rebuilt to allow Charing Cross trains from South East London and Kent to dive down to almost street level under a new route carrying Thameslink services from Croydon, and back up again.
In addition 20 bridges between New Cross and Waterloo East are being strengthened to carry the new track alignments that are necessary to provide 24 train paths per hour though London’s central core from Blackfriars to St Pancras.
