London Bridge passengers face more rail disruption

New platforms and signalling at the station have caused travel disruption in January.

Passengers using London Bridge station will face further disruption for more than a year because of rebuilding work, rail authorities have warned.

Commuters travelling to London Bridge on Southeastern's Charing Cross services must take different routes.

The disruption results from work on north side platforms.

The rebuilding work is part of the government-sponsored £6.5bn Thameslink Programme.

The £6.5bn Thameslink Programme is intended to transform north-south travel through London

Services to Charing Cross station calling at London Bridge are due to resume in August 2016.

Simon Blanchflower, Network Rail's Thameslink programme director, said: "We realise this will mean big changes to some people's journeys and we have worked with operators across the industry, including Transport for London (TfL), to make sure people can plan their new journeys and get to their destinations without extra cost."

Network Rail apologised to passengers for major disruption last week when a new timetable was introduced for Southern and Thameslink trains at London Bridge.

The company said it was reviewing services and had made changes to ease crowding on the station concourse, including new customer information screens and more staff.

Other service changes

Charing Cross services to and from New Cross, St Johns, Deptford, Greenwich, Maze Hill and Westcombe Park will be diverted to and from Cannon Street
Charing Cross services to Plumstead, Woolwich Dockyard, Belvedere and Erith will be diverted to run to Cannon Street
Some trains will be diverted to or from an alternative London terminal
There will be longer opening hours for Cannon Street station (05:00-01:00 GMT), including all day opening on Sundays
Some trains from Rochester, Broadstairs, Ashford, Dover and Orpington will be diverted into London Blackfriars
Catford Loop services will no longer be part of the Southeastern timetable

Network Rail said the new concourse at London Bridge will increase passenger capacity by 65% when complete.

At 178 years old, London Bridge is the city's oldest surviving rail terminus.

An announcement from TfL then came that from Monday 12th January so as to ease disruption at London Bridge Station, thirty extra buses were added to three routes (ten on each) on Monday to Friday, plus the introduction of a shuttle bus service between Canada Water and Waterloo (Russell Young)

So for at least the next six weeks the following routes would be boosted as follows:

21 Evening only

10 additional double-decks: 1600-hours to 1930 one way only from London Bridge via Borough High Street to Lewisham, where each bus does two trips.

47 Evening only

10 additional double-decks: 1555-hours to 1930 one way only from London Bridge via Duke Street Hill to Lewisham (not Catford), each bus does two trips.

381 Morning

From London Bridge to Waterloo shuttle only.

381 Evening

5-10 additional double-decks: 1600-hours to 1930 from Waterloo, York Road to Canada Water.

Some of the above will be operated by provincial livered Stagecoach buses such as former London Dennis Trident 17010 brought back into the Capital from the Manchester fleet (Gerard Butler)

Then additionally for the first week at the moment:

Service E:

20 additional double-decks: 0630 - 1100 and 1530 - 2000 in both directions from

Canada Water via Bermondsey, London Bridge and Southwark to Waterloo, York Road serving stations only. These extra buses have been supplied by Ensignbus, a snapshot of some provided by Gerard Butler as follows:

With this rail disruption due to last at least all of this year, it remains to be seen how the 'extra bus' provision develops. Furthermore, in order to distinguish these extras from existing buses on routes, an edict from TfL has instructed that such buses must operate in basic liveries other than red, apart that is from certain buses that are obviously not the usual sight on normal service.