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Olympic challenge


Theo Steel, Olympics project director for National Express East Anglia, gives a personal view of the progress at Stratford ahead of the Games


The Olympic site in Stratford, east London


but will later be boarded over to become the athletes’ warm up area, returning to rail use after the Games. Work is now in progress to plan


the train services to run to Stratford during the Olympics – up to 250,000 passengers will visit the site in a day. With so many options, we believe that the demand can be met by running longer and some later trains on Great Eastern and C2C. The Olympics are a great


n


While the Olympics and Paralympics in 2012 will


involve locations as widely spread as Glasgow, Weymouth, Hadleigh (Essex), Cheshunt and many other locations in London, the core of the action will be on the Railway Lands site at Stratford. At the beginning of 2004, the


IOC visited London and expressed concern about the transport links from central London to the then proposed Stratford site. By January 2005, the Javelin service on HS1 had been proposed to supplement the Jubilee, Central, Great Eastern, Docklands and North London lines as well as C2C and the District Line further south. These measures will enable more than 150,000 people per hour to access the Games. Key railway schemes at


Stratford include: PAGE 30 SEPTEMBER 2010


n The removal of Thornton Fields Sidings to Orient Way, north of the Eurostar depot, where there are 12 sidings, each with capacity for 12 cars, with modern facilities;


n The rebuilding of Stratford station to include more room on the slow ‘E’ lines/Central line platforms, extra staircases and lifts;


n Fashioning a new concourse on the north side of the station to link in with the new North London Line platforms and a new bridge over the railway to link the Westfield shopping centre with Stratford’s centre;


n Extending platform 10a so 12-car trains can call at peak times and longer freight units can be recessed there. This involves rebuilding Angel Road bridge just east of Stratford station; and


n Putting a new platform face on the south side of the London- bound Central Line, enabling customers to join/alight on both sides of the train. The emphasis is on getting all


the facilities in place by mid-2011 so that they can be extensively tested. Some work has already been completed. On Docklands Light Railway, new platforms for existing trains have been opened and work continues to convert the line to Canning Town on the DLR and extend it to Stratford International. DLR capacity is being increased by up to 50 per cent by lengthening trains to six-car units.


On High Speed 1, the domestic service is now operating to and from Stratford, while the freight facilities at Bow Road are in intensive use to supply the site,


opportunity for transport operators in London, in particular, to show themselves at their best. Much effort is going into improving reliability – for instance Network Rail is replacing all the fixed tension 1949/56 overhead line equipment remaining on the Great Eastern. Clearly the money being spent will benefit users after the Olympics. Currently, at peak times, there are not enough trains stopping to serve the 100,000-plus people now working at Canary Wharf. The longer platform 10a will allow more trains to stop. The transport legacy from the


Olympics will be very positive and will be matched by new housing for 17,000 people created by the Olympic village. In addition, more than 30 new bridges and roads will have been constructed. Railway operators will also


have a shopping centre the size of Bluewater on their doorstep and many of the rivers will no longer be tidal allowing for pleasant parkland walks. The one challenge remaining is to get Platforms 9 and 10 up to the standard of the rest of the station and covered before the Games are upon us.


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