Elizabeth Line (CrossRail) opened 24th May 2022

The Southend lines were considered in the original Crossrail plans before Abbey Wood was thought of. Abbey Wood came about because the original Jubilee plans to go there were abandoned even though the step-plate junction tunnels were built at North Greenwich.

This was at a time when no new small diameter tube lines would be built which was disregarded to build Battersea extension of the Northern Line. So there might still be hope for a Bakerloo Line extension.

Forest Gate Junction joins the slow lines, i.e. the ones now dedicated to Elizabeth Line services, which will be 10tph in both directions even off peak. The crossing for the direction towards Barking is flat over the westbound. I doubt there's any space in the timetable to fit many c2c services through those gaps, especially given there are still some freight paths that thread the needle.

Fenchurch Street is on a viaduct and is surrounded by buildings. If you were to extend over the surface, you'd need to buy and dismantle a huge number of properties that are large, expensive, and/or historical in the City of London. Not gonna happen.

Network Rail has proposed moving Fenchurch Street to the current site of Tower Gateway to meet demand by 2050. Not mentioned in the report is whether this would create better connections. Though it might coincide with a long term plan by TfL to close Tower Gateway and build new platforms between Shadwell and Bank that are better connected to Tower Hill station, maybe as part of other DLR schemes to extend somewhere beyond Bank. Easier transfer might be possible between New Fenchurch Street at Minories and this new integrated Tower Hill station.

Another possibility would be to connect the line to a future Crossrail tunnel across London linking with another terminal, with tunnel portals in East London, but this would cost tens of billions of pounds and would likely need 20 years from conception to opening. And frankly there are other routes that have far greater needs, like the existing Crossrail 2 proposal, or the Euston-Waterloo corridor occasionally mooted for Crossrail 3.

A toilet update.

In addition to the toilets installed by the project on the northbound Thameslink platform at Farringdon, new toilets have now opened at level -3 above the Elizabeth line platforms (level -4) at Canary Wharf. These have been provided by Canary Wharf Limited in a new retail area.

Since the E.Line forms a high-speed version of the Central Line between Stratford and Ealing, has there been any noticeable drop in usage of the older line?

The Central Line were hoping to reduce Ealing services in consequence, allowing a boost to central area peak services with the same fleet size.

Does the Abbey Wood frequency improve from 10tph in the May timetable? Ran 12tph when it was the only stage open but now 10tph.

It's actually just Terminal 2/3 now; Terminal 1 has closed permanently.

But if they did that, you'd have to make the line diagram more complex.

Yes it will. Current 8tph off-peak/10tph peak service between Canary Wharf and Abbey Wood will increase to 10tph off-peak/12tph peak.

I thought they were supposed to be gone on Nov 26th? Did that get pushed back?

Ah ha, thanks for the correction.

From MyLondon News

To change from Elizabeth line to Victoria line at Bond Street/Oxford Circus:

1. At Bond Street, follow the signs to the Hanover Square exit on the platforms, this will take you to the front of trains towards Abbey Wood/Shenfield and the back of trains towards Heathrow/Reading.

2. Go up the long escalator and exit the station through the ticket barriers

3. Go straight ahead across Hanover Square to the end of Princes Street

4. At the end of Princes Street, turn left onto Regent Street and you will see the entrance to Oxford Circus Tube station in front of you

5. Go down the steps into the station and through the ticket barriers

6. Follow signs to the right Victoria line platform - northbound to Walthamstow Central or southbound to Brixton.

Oxford Circus is signposted on the wayfinding signs on the Elizabeth line platforms at Bond Street

To change from Victoria line to Elizabeth line at Bond Street/Oxford Circus:

1. At Oxford Circus, head towards the way out, go through the ticket barriers

2. Head for Exit 3 (Regent Street South). When you reach street level outside the Microsoft store, turn around and head along Regent Street. If this is closed, head to exits 1, 2, 4 or 5 and look for the Microsoft store when you arrive at street level, cross over to that side and walk along Regent Street.

3. Take the first right along Regent Street into Princes Street, there's a bus stop on the corner

4. At the end of Princes Street, head across Hanover Square right in front of you.

5. You'll find the Hanover Square entrance to Bond Street Elizabeth line station on the left hand side - enter and go through the ticket barriers

6. Go to the bottom of the long escalators and turn left for trains to Reading/Heathrow and right for trains to Abbey Wood/Shenfield.

Under the pedestrianised Princes St to Regent Street, and into the southern side of the ticket hall... I can't see anything that's blocking that route, but it did need a lot of concrete foam pumping in to stabilise the ground in that area. Maybe it was just mission creep? But an long corridor would make the interchange more obvious and useful.

Oxford Circus struggles to cope with the present volume of passengers, especially in the ticket hall. The site is very constrained and there is no way to expand without very major engineering works, and doing two major railway engineering projects in close proximity at the same time would have been a bad idea even if that was budget (which there wasn't). Additionally, it was presumably felt that doing anything before knowing what the effects of Crossrail were wouldn't be the best use of funds.

The London Reconnections article at www.londonreconnections.com/2019/operation-umbrella-rebuilding-oxford-circus/ makes no mention of Hanover Square, but does say that a 230-metre tunnel was dug from Cavendish square (the centre of which is about 300 metres north of the centre of Hanover Square)