£120m for Gatwick
New concourse and wider platforms included in Network Rail’s plans a £120 million upgrade for Gatwick Airport station.
GATWICK Airport station is to receive a new concourse and wider platforms by 2022, as part of Network Rail’s £120 million plan to improve the station’s ability to handle passengers.
NR plans to build the new concourse above the station’s platforms, in the space between the airport’s north and south footbridges that link its southern terminal to car parks and public transport links on the eastern side of the Brighton Main Line.
The new concourse will feature an arched roof with ETFE panels (similar to those at Birmingham New Street), that will sit at right angles to the tracks and platforms below it.
In its application to Crawley Borough Council for planning permission, NR explains that the new concourse will handle passengers arriving by rail and send them via existing station footbridges either to the airport’s south concourse or directly to the car park and transport interchange. This concourse will sit above Platforms 5, 6 and 7, with NR planning to make the Platform 5/6 island wider on its Platform 6 side.
The station’s existing concourse will be dedicated to passengers arriving to use trains from the airport or car park. NR says this concourse will be decluttered and have ticket barriers removed.
Work will take place from east to west, with all lines through the station closed over Christmas 2019. After enabling works, NR plans to demolish Platform 7 (which was only built in 2014) while the line through it remains open.
Over Christmas 2019, NR plans to demolish its bridge to Platforms 5/6 and remove the track through Platform 6. The next stage continues with the track through what was Platform 5 remaining open, Platform 4 temporarily extended, and a new Platform 7 and track in use. During this stage Platform 6 will be made wider and the steel erected to support the new concourse above.
Removing one line through the station will mean changing service patterns, says NR in its planning
application. In off-peak hours, NR expects to cancel two trains per hour, while peak hours will have normal services.
When Platforms 5/6 reopen, passengers will use part of the new concourse to leave the station. When all work is complete, incoming passengers will use the existing concourse while arrivals on Platforms 1-4 will use the station’s existing footbridges and Platform 5-7 passengers will use the new concourse to reach those footbridges and then the southern terminal.
Support for NR’s planning application comes from the Sussex Chamber of Commerce, the airport and its consultative committee, and Mid-Sussex District Council. Crawley Borough Council spokesman Allan Hambly told RAIL a decision is expected at the council’s planning committee meeting on September 25.