HS2’s new west London mega-hub gets planning go-ahead
HS2’s west London rail hub at Old Oak Common has this evening received planning approval from the Old Oak and Park Royal Development Corporation.
The green light means that work can progress on building what will be the largest new railway station ever built in the UK.
The station will have 14 platforms, a mix of six high speed and eight conventional service platforms, with a 850m long station box, with a volume to fit 6,300 Routemaster buses.
When operational, the station will be used by up to an estimated 250,000 passengers each day and is set to become one of the busiest railway stations in the country.
The HS2 rail link will connect with mainline rail services at Old Oak Common, as well as Crossrail’s Elizabeth Line and the Heathrow Express.
Matthew Botelle, HS2’s stations director said: “The planning approval for the Old Oak Common super-hub station is an important milestone in the delivery of Britain’s new world-class low carbon railway.
“Building a new railway station for the UK on this scale and size will be an incredible achievement for British engineering”.
A joint venture of Balfour Beatty, Vinci and Systra were awarded the contract to build the station in September last year and are set to begin work on site next month.
The station will form the centre of plans to redevelop the whole neighbourhood, with the hope of creating tens of thousands of new homes and jobs.
The planning permission comes after the Public Accounts Committee found that the controversial project, which only got final approval from the government in February, was “badly off course”.
MPs expressed serious concerns over the transparency of the project’s executives, both at HS2 itself and the Department for Transport.
The project is significantly behind its initial timescale and over budget, with estimates in the Oakervee review pricing in at above £100bn.