Elizabeth Line (CrossRail) opened 24th May 2022

All the stations the train will call at on its journey will be listed. So a Heathrow T4 to Abbey Wood train will, at T4, list Heathrow T123*, Hayes & Harlington, Southall, Hanwell, West Ealing, Ealing Broadway, Acton Main Line, Paddington, Bond Street, Tottenham Court Road, Farringdon, Liverpool Street, Whitechapel, Canary Wharf, Custom House**, Woolwich Arsenal and Abbey Wood.

*Or whatever the name of the station is
**Or maybe Custom House for Excel

It's de facto 'London's Newest Tube', whatever the cognoscenti might wish to call it.

Watching a recent you tube video of a trip through the core made me wonder if the builders were asked to provide passive provision for longer trains?



As you can see the starting signal on several platforms appears to be located short of the end of the platform doors sections - and most platforms have what appears to be storage areas before/after the platform edge sections, which could potentially be converted to platform space proper to accomodate one or more extra coaches.

Are they hoping to make the 345's even longer if the demand picks up or is it they are only planning on running 7 cars to start with through the core - so like they did on other sections of the Elizabeth Line?

The space beyond the platform ends has equipment rooms. Access is via fenced off walkways which means they can be reached with trains running provided you have the appropriate training.

I wonder if the current configuration will continue? I'm looking out over the GN suburban, and I do feel rather sorry for the operator shuttling 12/8 indivisible carriages of fresh air around, not much more than a year after the 3-car 313s got retired

I think that everyone is desperately hoping that by Christmas the entire length of the trains will be needed - even if not yet back at 'crush loads'.

I am sure that this change of "ownership" milestone is something CrossRail chiefs and indeed all those involved will wish to celebrate especially given past delays in finishing and handing over stuff.

However from the public's point of view I assume that little or none of that new TFL infrastructure will actually be open to the public until the whole core is cleared for passenger use.

I was in Ilford Town centre today - the new Ilford Hill station building is still closed (I was not expecting it to be open but thought that as I was so close to it I'd take a look) and for the first time in a while I saw people working at the main station entrance in Cranbrook Road. Nevertheless it still remains little more than a metal girder frame structure over an empty parcel of land.

I did a walk around the station and there is no link to the Barbican platforms. It would have required additional lifts. 

There is only a single lift from the western end of the westbound MET H&C Circle platform to Elizabeth Line, no other access

There's a good image showing the layout of the Barbican end of Farringdon station here, which suggests there is indeed a lift to the westbound Met/Circle/H&C platform.

The full report the image is from: learninglegacy.crossrail.co.uk/documents/development-two-different-station-designs-comparison-paddington-farringdon-stations/

Nice roundel right there

That is an extremely odd design choice. It can't be down to the masonry not being strong enough to support it, as it's being supported in almost exactly the same place it otherwise would be, there are a couple of other cables it would have had to cross, but that's hardly unique or insurmountable.

Cheaper than going vertical then horizontal