Crossrail faces another delay ... until 2021
As brand new trains worth millions sit idle in depot, passengers told:
‘We have picked up serious issues’
STRETCHING away into the distance, row upon row of Crossrail’s high- tech trains stand idle in a depot. They are part of a £1billion fleet that should by now have been carrying more than half a million passengers a day on the new Elizabeth line from Reading, under central London, and out to Abbey Wood in south- east London and Shenfield in Essex.
Instead, more than 50 of the new trains are sitting idle, with most of them stored at a new multi- million- pound depot in Old Oak Common in northwest London.
Yesterday it emerged that they could be there for a great deal longer – possibly until spring 2021.
Just 15 of 70 new trains are being used for existing, limited, Crossrail services. More are parked up at other depots across the country, including Ilford in Essex and Derby.
The latest delay comes as engineers struggle to link up the trains’ software with the networks’ signalling systems.
Labour MP Meg Hillier, chairman of the Commons public accounts committee, which has published a scathing report on the project, said: ‘The image of brand new trains sitmore ting there doing nothing will be deeply frustrating for passengers crammed into trains like cattle.’
Caroline Pidgeon, chairman of the London Assembly transport committee, said: ‘To the average passenger forced to travel on crammed trains looking at a line of unused trains will be painful. It’s insulting.
‘Crossrail was seen as a flagship project for Britain. It is now way behind schedule and over budget.’
The link was meant to be opened by the Queen on December 9 last year. But at the end of August London Mayor Sadiq Khan announced the opening would be pushed back by at least nine months.
The goal posts shifted again a few months later as Crossrail’s new boss Mark Wild admitted he had no idea when the line would open.
It was also revealed it would cost – with the Government stepping in with emergency loans of up to £2.8billion.
Now Europe’s biggest infrastructure project has descended deeper into farce. As well as failing to finish renovating stations such as Bond Street and Paddington, the engineers have still not managed to integrate three signalling systems on the route with the new trains.
They have also fallen behind on installing the communications systems at the stations, including 50km (30miles) of cables, 200 CCTV cameras and 200 radio antennas.
There are fears that the budget will rise again. It has already soared by £3billion from £14.8billion in 2010 to around £17.6billion.
A senior source associated with Crossrail told the BBC the ‘bestcase scenario’ would be an opening in spring 2020. A ‘middle probability’ would be the summer of 2020, while the ‘worst case’ is spring 2021. The source said that testing trains and signalling was ‘proving more difficult than was first thought’.
Mr Wild said: ‘We have picked up several serious issues that explain why we want to be testing.’
Crossrail bought 70 Bombardier Class 345 trains for more than £1billion. At 200 metres long, they have space for 1,500 passengers in their nine, interconnected carriages. They have air conditioning, wi-fi and are said to be 30 per cent more efficient.
A Crossrail spokesman said: ‘London needs the Elizabeth line completed as quickly as possible. We will be providing more details later this month.’ Current services run from Liverpool Street station east out to Shenfield and west from Paddington to Hayes and Harlington.