Bank station’s £700m improvement programme nears completion

The new escalators that opened at Bank station on October 13 have trimmed nine minutes off the journey for passengers changing between the London Underground and Docklands Light Railway.

They are the latest new feature of a wide-ranging station reconstruction that has cost £700 million and taken six years so far. Completion of the entire project is now only months away.

It is now far easier to cross over from the Northern Line concourse, which opened six months ago. And more improvements will follow with the opening of a more direct interchange between the Northern and Central lines, consisting of two new 95-metre moving walkways and three new escalators.

A new entrance is also being created on Cannon Street, alongside step-free access to the Northern Line for the first time via two new lifts, and better step-free access to the DLR.

Bank, always considered a congested station because of its importance in London’s financial area, is having its capacity increased by 40%. Almost half of the station’s users are reckoned to use its interchange facilities.

The latest changes come at a time when the station is still recovering from a heavy loss of business caused by the pandemic.

Two-thirds of its passengers are estimated to have returned (twice the January figure), while weekend ridership is back to 85% of its former level.

Between them, Bank and the adjacent Monument stations are served by five Underground lines and the DLR. They have four ticket halls (to become five with Cannon Street), seven lifts (rising to nine), and ten platforms. When the total of 27 escalators is reached, Bank will have the largest number on the Tube network.

Transport for London’s achievements at this location so far include over half a mile of new tunnels requiring the extraction of over 200,000 tonnes of spoil.

The new, wider and higher southbound Northern Line platform and concourse opened in May, with the new southbound tunnel connected up during the closure of the Bank branch of the Northern Line earlier this year.

A new entrance at the Bloomberg building opened in November 2018, with two lifts, four escalators, its own ticket hall, and easier access to the Waterloo & City Line. Two more lift shafts are nearing completion.

And to make it easier for passengers to understand the new walkways, there is new signage and cladding in contrasting colours.