TWO new platforms at East Croydon station are among the plans published today by Network Rail detailing how it wants to improve the London to Brighton mainline to accommodate a 'huge growth' in passenger numbers.
As well as the East Croydon platform expansion, the rail infrastructure company has earmarked improvements to junctions at Windmill Bridge in Selhurst, where the London Bridge and Victoria lines converge, and Stoats Nest near Coulsdon.
Network Rail wants to complete the infrastructure improvements between 2019 and 2024 to help reduce bottlenecks on the line.
Members of the public have been invited to give feedback on the proposals as part of a 90 day consultation.
Steve Knight, Network Rail area director for Sussex, said: "This part of our network already brings more than 60,000 passengers into central London every hour at peak times and that number is only going to grow.
"Over the last twenty years the industry has been able to significantly increase the capacity on the railway, but we're fast approaching the point where there simply isn't any more space for more trains on the busiest parts of the network. So we have to look at ways of increasing the capacity of our network further.
"The plans we are proposing would provide the capacity for an additional 9,000 passengers every peak hour on the Brighton Main Line on top of the additional capacity that the Thameslink programme will already deliver into London Bridge in 2018.
"In addition, we and Transport for London are planning for growth on our suburban routes in south and south east London, which also need provision for longer, more frequent trains.
"We are also looking at what kind of improvements we can offer in reliability and frequency by introducing new technology which will allow us to squeeze even more out of the existing network.
"It's fantastic that more and more people want to travel by train and we want to provide the railway to take them where they are going."
The consultation document can be viewed here.
