Shepherd's Bush Overground: Idiots!

The Good News: They've finished filling in the gap in the platform left by moving the wall back.

The Bad News: They've put those fscking street lights back in!


On the other platform they've finishing paving over the gap where the new entrance is (see the last update), but they still need to put the panes of glass over where the old one was:

There's now very little left to do other than fixing a handful of cosmetic gaps and putting up Overground signs. I've noticed the protective plywood is off the ticket barriers, so the place is on its way back from being a building site and to a railway station.

As an aside, the last issue of Modern Railways contains a brief note blaiming the narrow platform on the need to accommodate the West London Tram terminus alongside. Here's a diagram from the planning application, with the Overground platforms in orange and the tram tracks highlighted in red:
Not terribly convincing.

What the Overground disruption is for

As I've posted about before, most of the London Overground network is going to be disrupted this autumn for engineering work. If you haven't seen it, the official leaflet about the replacement buses and changes to service is online.

But I wanted to go over what work they're doing and why, and how it will benefit passenger services. Basically, the problem is freight traffic, particularly container traffic from the ports around the coast of Essex and Suffolk. A lot of this traffic ends up going north on West Coast Main Line, and the only real way to get there is along the most congested part of the North London Line. Here's a diagram:

The current main freight route is in dark blue. Freight from the LT&S Line has to run across both pairs of tracks of the Great Eastern Main Line. Freight from both directions has to pass along the two track section of the North London Line from Stratford to Dalston Kingsland, which is also one of the busiest passenger sections.

It should be obvious from the diagram that it'd be much better to send freight from the LT&S Line along the Gospel Oak to Barking Line (shown in light blue), and that's exactly what they're trying to do. The problem that needs fixing first is that bridges and tunnels along the route aren't tall enough to allow modern containers through. During the closure three bridges over the Gospel Oak to Barking Line will be demolished, and the track in Hampstead Tunnel will be lowered.

Similar upgrades to other rail routes are planned to reduce the importance of the London Overground network to freight. Work to allow larger containers on the Felixstowe-Ely-Peterbrough-Leicester-Nuneaton will provide an alternative to the North London Line, while Southampton-Basingstoke-Reading-Oxford will provide an alternative to the West London Line.

The frequency increases on the London Overground network can only happen if freight traffic is properly managed, and these various upgrades are an important part of that.

Imperial Wharf station: New design unveiled

I've found out what the "construction work" that's supposed to have started at Imperial Wharf station amounts to. They've put a new rendering on the hoarding:

Compared to the old rendering, it's gained Overground branding; shorter simpler canopies, and ticket barriers. You can just see the ticket office, which will be built along the back wall of the arch with a public area in front. An identical set of ticket barriers, lift and stairs will be on the other side of the viaduct for the other platform, and I presume the level access for wheelchair users to get into the station will be that side too.

As I've mentioned in previous posts, the arch is a disused road bridge. Here's a clearer picture of it than I've posted before:
You can also see there's still no sign of construction work starting.

If anyone's still confused about Imperial Wharf is on the rail network, it shows up in red on this old version of the London Connections map, opening "early 2006".

Shepherd's Bush Overground: Wall moving complete

Each time I visit Shepherd's Bush Overground, they've made some significant step towards fixing the dodgy platform.

This time, they've filled in the gap between the station building and the moved wall:
Thus the station once again has a continuous retaining wall, and they're now in the cosmetic tidying up phase of the work.

Just out of shot, they've started reinstating the horizontal beams between the metal fence posts at the top of the wall. If they're sensible this will be followed by moving the platform equipment on to the fence and ditching the lamp posts, but it could go either way at this point.

Meanwhile, they've been busy on the other platform too:
They're making it so that the entrance is towards us onto the wide section of platform, rather than to the right onto the narrow section. As on the other platform, this has required adding a great big ugly steel beam to hold the structure together (ignore the yellow scaffold tower in the right picture).

I've also just been sent some pictures by someone who's been on site. This one is taken from the unwidened section at the far north end of the station, and shows exactly how narrow it was as built:
That glass box in the distance is what my second pictures above are of.

More progress at Shepherd's Bush Overground

Things are certainly moving quickly at Shepherd's Bush Overground station. Since two weeks ago...

They've built a neat connection between the moved and unmoved sections of wall:

They've moved all but these last 4 blocks, and cut away that inconvenient pillar and installed a chunky bit of steelwork to take the weight (before):

Instead of putting in new wall-mounted streetlights (like they were meant to), it looks worryingly like they're just moving the old ones:

They're just toying with us, right?

Imperial Wharf station: No progress yet

We got word last week that construction work at Imperial Wharf station was meant to be getting under way. There's currently no sign that it has:
I'm posting this as a Before picture, and I've doodled on the rough location of the platforms. The dark brick structure by the platform ends is a disused road bridge, and will contain the ticket office.

Here's a rendering of the finished thing, as seen on the construction hoarding that's been taunting the residents for possibly several years:

Located on the West London Line just north of the river, near Chelsea Harbour. Opens 2010.

Shepherd's Bush Overground: wall moving

3 weeks into the work at Shepherd's Bush to move that wall and they've started repositioning the wall segments in what looks like their final position:
They can't be much more than a few feet further back, but it looks like it doubles the available space behind the yellow line.

Meanwhile they've demolished the top half of the wall by the station building (see last week), and dug a big hole behind the bottom half:
Still that post supporting the footbridge to be dealt with.

Shepherd's Bush Overground update

Progress on widening the platform at Shepherd's Bush Overground station continues, with segments of the wall now removed:
They haven't started digging along the rest of the platform.

One of the big challenges is widening the platform where it meets the station building. They've removed the facing panels from the wall that needs demolishing:
As I suspected, there's a steel post holding up the footbridge in the most inconvenient place.

Imperial Wharf funding plan approved

Last night Hammersmith & Fulham council approved the funding plan for Imperial Wharf station, which means everything is in place for the station to go ahead, with construction starting later this year, and opening in 2010.

The station will be located on an embankment section of the West London Line between West Brompton and Clapham Junction, and served by London Overground and possibly Southern.

[Update: Southern trains that on the WLL will call at all stops except Imperial Wharf, according to themodel timetable for the North London Line upgrade]

The entrances will be on Townmead Road, which is the road passing under the new bridge* by the bus in the photo above (taken from the southwest). The ticket office will be located within the old bridge to the right, with ticket barriers and stairs up to the platforms either side. I did once locate the planning application which showed all this in detail, but it's alluding me right now - the rendering on Always Touch Out sort of shows the set up.

(* which the Railtrack signs call "Yuppies". It appears to have been built for access to the luxury flats in the photo. Is there a story here?)

[Thanks, anonymous commenter]

Shepherd's Bush Overground hole getting bigger

The work to widen the platform at Shepherd's Bush seems to be moving ahead quickly):

It was barely started last Tuesday. They only seem to be bothering with the southern half of the platform, nearest the station building, at least for now.

And it's nice to see the station finally being used for something, even if it's just as a site office:

The Imperial Wharf council meeting

Today's council meeting that could have finally given the green light to Imperial Wharf station seemed too momentous an occasion to miss, so I popped along, and this is what I found.

I was going to make a joke at their expense, but then I spotted this in the agenda:

The Cabinet is invited to resolve [...] that the public and press be excluded from the meeting

So that was a waste of time*. We'll just have to wait for the press release.

Anyway, the budget contains a lot of juicy information anyway. They've acquired a huge pile of cash:

• The Committee also agreed to reallocate to the station £750k of Section 106 funds initially earmarked for expansion of primary schools required for Imperial Wharf but no longer considered to be necessary. This, together with interest earned on the station Section 106 account since 2000, amounts to a total of £4.25 million available from St George
• £1 million from Transport for London complementary measures for the western extension of the congestion charge (already received and with interest accruing).
• £1 million from the Lots Road power station development, payable on commencement of development on the land in Hammersmith and Fulham.
• Up to £650,000 on offer from the Royal Borough of Kensington and Chelsea (subject to a Council decision)
• £300,000 Section 106 funding from Chelsea Harbour design centre, payable upon commencement of development.
• £60,000 Section 106 funding already received (with interest accruing) from Sainsbury’s, Townmead Road.

That's over £7 million. The final price for the station is a secret (though it was £7.93m), but Hammersmith & Fulham Council are apparently willing to pay the remainder, including if any of the above deals fall through. They'll be paying St George to handle construction of the station. Network Rail and Transport for London don't seem to be involved at all, beyond being consulted on the design.

* It does also say "Members of the Public are welcome to attend" in bold on the front page, so I am quite grumpy

Shepherd's Bush Overground platform widening begins

Ain't it a lovely day today? The sun is shining, Imperial Wharf is being built, and they've started digging a hole behind the legendary wall at Shepherd's Bush Overground:

Inside the ticket hall, they've put up fences and boxed up the gates:

This is the first time anything at all at the station has changed in six months.

(And yes the lift and the station signs are still pointlessly switched on)

[Thanks to Dazz285 for the tip off]

Imperial Wharf to open by 2010

The flood of press releases does contain one interesting statement:

There are 73 stations on the London Overground network; 50 on the North London Railway with two new stations due to open on the West London line by 2010 and 17 stations on the East London line with four new stations due to open in 2010

One is obviously Shepherd's Bush, and even that saga should be over soon. So we're looking at a timescale - however flimsy - for the construction of Imperial Wharf, which we haven't heard anything about since October.

The station also makes an appearance in the provisional future timetable. There's still hope.

Update: More than just hope (press release) [Thanks D-Notice]

Shepherd's Bush / Wood Lane update

Before I start, potentially big news: An anonymous commenter reports that work has begun today to move the wall at Shepherd's Bush Overground after six months of inactivity. Can anyone confirm?

[Update 9/4: I'm thinking false alarm or hoax or they've buggered off already]

Anyway, some pictures I took last week. The entrance to Wood Lane tube station has gained solid walls since February:

And the platforms: (click to enlarge)

Moving just around the corner to Shepherd's Bush tube station.
This gap is where the original building stood, of which nothing remains. The framework must be to protect the escalator replacement works. On the right is one half of the new building, which will eventually cover the whole site.

London Overground train order number crunching

TfL have put out a short press release announcing a second expansion of the order for new trains for London Overground, a move mooted a month ago. As expected, the order is for 7 additional 4-car trains.

I'd like to say what the new total is, but the numbers don't add up. Previous indications were that the final fleet would be 54 trains, but the press release mentions the 7 as being in addition to the "44 trains" of the original order. They seem to have forgotten about the 3 extra trains they ordered last July.

The documentation for the North London Line upgrade sums up the delivery schedule thus:

• The original order, which was 24 3-car trains for the North London Line, West London Line and Watford DC Line, plus 20 4-car trains for the East London Line
• Tranche 1: Extending the 24 NLL et al trains to 4 cars.
• Tranche 2: 3 extra trains to cover ELL services from Dalston Junction to Highbury & Islington, and 3 trains for the Stratford to Camden Road shuttle, plus a maintenance spare.

Today's order corresponds to Tranche 2. Again, the 3 trains from last July have disappeared. It might just be that they mentioned in this document due to being specifically for the ELL, and additionally whoever prepared today's press release simply forgot about them, but it's all very strange.

On a related note, I've also just spotted that the draft timetable assumes the new diesel trains on the Gospel Oak to Barking Line will be 3-car, which gives some hope they'll be given third cars within the next few years. 

It also mentions  that six trains from the East London Line fleet will be stabled in Stratford overnight, which would mean some or all of the ELL fleet will be dual voltage, as the ELL is entirely third rail and the route to Stratford is AC overhead only. Previously it was thought the ELL would be built without overhead capabilities.

Going back to today's press release, it  notes that the new trains will have the "look and feel of Tube trains" and there will be "six passenger information displays inside" (per train? per carriage?), as well as previously known information about the carriage connections being walk-through (think bendy bus) and the trains having air conditioning.

South London RUS published

Network Rail have published their South London Route Utilisation Strategy, which propose forthcoming changes to services. There's a bewildering amount of information included (not to mention the diagrams), but here are some highlights related to high-profile schemes.

London Overground:

• The East London Line phase 2 extension via the South London Line is recommended.
• The South London Line service from Victoria to London Bridge is almost certain to be withdrawn, but they propose several replacement services that will use sections of the line (diagram on page 99), so most journeys should still be possible direct, and all will with a same platform change at Denmark Hill. This excludes Battersea Park, which will lose its SLL platforms when its others are extended.
• The Southern Watford Junction-Brighton services via the West London Line will be curtailed at South Croydon in 2009.
• An extra (possibly peak-only) service on the West London Line will run all stops Shepherd's Bush to South Croydon. Not going further north means 8-car third rail only trains could be used. Trains will reverse in the closed Eurostar depot north of Shepherd's Bush.

The Thameslink Programme:

• It's acknowledged that the Thameslink Programme Key Output 0 has slipped to March 2009 (page 5 and 140). The Moorgate branch lives on!
• The 2011 service (Key Output 1) will add Rochester, Maidstone East, Sevenoaks, Orpington and extra stopping services to Three Bridges.
• The final Thameslink service in 2015 (Key Output 2) will consist of:
  • 4 tph (trains per hour) fast-ish to Brighton, 4tph semi-fast to Gatwick and Horsham, 4tph slow to Sydenham and beyond, 2 tph to East Grinstead and 4 tph to Orpington and beyond via Lewisham (all 12-car via London Bridge).
  • Via Elephant and Castle there will be 4 tph on the Catford Loop and 2 tph into Kent, all 8-car trains.
  • Note the disappearance of stalwart proposed distinations such as Dartford, Eastbourne, Ashford, Littlehampton and Guildford and the curtailing of the Wimbledon Loop at Blackfriars.
  (illustrated above, taken from page 117)

For other suburban services, there are 10 and 12 car extensions planned and lots of other enhancements, but there's far too much to even summarise here.

The North London Line upgrade

Thanks to an anonymous commenter for pointing out that a whole load of info about the future of the North London Line has turned up on the Office of Rail Regulation website.


For one thing, they've chosen a service pattern, which I've illustrated above (the big numbers are frequency in tph, or trains per hour). The service on the North London Line are:

• 4 tph Stratford - Camden Road - Gospel Oak - Willesden Junction - Richmond (the current North London Line service)
• 2 tph Stratford - Camden Road - Gospel Oak - Willesden Junction - Clapham Junction
• 2 tph Stratford - Camden Road

That's a train every 7.5 minutes east of Camden Road. There are no trains via Primrose Hill to Queen's Park, as was once planned.

The 2 tph West London Line shuttle will continue, giving a train every 15 minutes between Clapham Junction and Willesden Junction. The Gospel Oak to Barking line stays self contained, with a 4 tph service, apparently due to the high cost of through platforms at Gospel Oak. The connections at Gospel Oak in the draft timetable don't look good. No upgrade to the Euston-Watford service is included yet.

There'll also be 8 trains per hour beyond Dalston Junction to Highbury & Islington. The diagram in the application form names them as the Crystal Palace and New Cross services, meaning the third service - from West Croydon - will only go as far as Dalston Junction.

There's a detailed diagram of the new track layout between Camden Road and Dalston, which confirms the plans for the East London Line to have a segregated route to Highbury & Islington, with little possibility of ELL trains continuing beyond there (forget about circular services). Highbury & Islington will end up with 3 eastbound platforms, each on a separate island.

Another document gives details of how stations will be refurbished, with improved CCTV, lighting, help points and PA systems. Stairs, flooring, walls, canopies and platform services will brought up to higher standards. LED next train indicators will be installed.

Construction work to rebuild the North London Line track begins this September, with the new timetable due in December 2010.

Shepherd's Bush Overground opening date: October 2008

This month's board papers have another update on the Shepherd's Bush Overground saga:

Network Rail and Westfield are making good progress towards a technical solution to the 'narrow' north-bound platform to be increased to a minimum width of 4m along a 4-car length, including the former pinch point at the bridge pier. The parties are seeking to open the station at least 4 weeks in advance of the opening of the shopping centre.

Now when's the shopping centre open? The latest line seems to be "by Christmas". The shopping centre's tube stations don't open until mid-October, so November-ish appears to be a safe bet for the shopping centre, and October for the Overground, coinciding with the other stations opening. This is pure speculation, mind.

Shepherd's Bush Overground: Wall to be moved

This month's board papers contain the first ever direct discussion by TfL of what happened and Shepherd's Bush, and what they plan to do about it:

A new station at Shepherd’s Bush on the West London Line (WLL) has been constructed by Westfield together with Network Rail, prior to TfL taking over responsibility for Overground services. It was hoped that this would be opened in time for the start of London Overground services, launched by the Mayor on the 12 November. However, the north-bound platform has insufficient width, given projected passenger levels. Dialogue has taken place with Westfield and Network Rail with a view to rectifying this situation by moving the platform retaining wall and widening access to the platform. It is hoped to provide an opening date once the project plan has been completed. It is estimated that the work will take 4 months following agreement to provide.

That puts the earliest opening possible opening date as mid-Summer.

Shepherd's Bush Overground: still arguing

I received an email from TfL today that all but confirms my suspicions about the station:

There are indeed some issues regarding the safety of the narrow northbound platform which must be resolved before the station can open. London Overground Rail Operations Limited, the operator of London Overground, have identified potential risks to passengers as trains pass at high speed. As the station is owned by Network Rail and is being developed by Westfield (the developers of the shopping centre), it is their responsibility to ensure that safety requirements are met.

What's implied is that Network Rail and Westfield are (or were) happy with the station as it is. The "built too narrow" farce angle may make a good headline, but it appears there's a genuine dispute about whether or not the platforms are safe.

As to what progress there is and when it might open:

Please be re-assured that TfL and LOROL are in regular contact with both parties, with a view to resolving these matters as soon as possible. At the moment, frustratingly, we are unable to confirm an opening date. London Rail has designated a senior manager to monitor developments, and both the Project Director at Westfield and the Network Rail director with responsibility for this station are working closely with him to determine a solution.

There's a tiny bit of hope something's happening. I had a look last weekend and nothing's changed. The current wording on TfL's project page is "due to open shortly".

(The picture is the station as shown on the shopping centre hoarding, where it has no platforms at all)

[Latest: The wall will be moved, taking at least four months]