London Underground (LU) has announced Costain Skanska JV, Dragados S.A and Morgan Sindall BeMo Tunnelling JV as the three shortlisted contractors bidding for the contract to design and build the tunnel link between Crossrail platforms and Bakerloo line platforms at Paddington Station.
Paddington is one of the busiest stations on the Tube network and to alleviate the additional passengers who will be interchanging between Crossrail and the Bakerloo line it is necessary to build a link between the two.
Around 44,000 passengers interchange to/from the Bakerloo line during the morning and evening peak and this is set to increase when Crossrail starts serving Paddington in 2018
Miles Ashley, LU’s Programme Director of Crossrail and Stations, said: “The building of the tunnel link is essential to support the increase in passengers when Crossrail starts serving the station at the end of 2018.
“The next stage of the process is to invite the three shortlisted contractors to engage in the Innovative Contractor Engagement procurement model, which we successfully used on the Bank Station Upgrade contract this summer, where the bids are assessed on the added value of their proposal, rather than on lowest cost.”
LU will be seeking innovative proposals against a RIBA E reference design for which a Transport Works Act Order (TWAO) is well progressed and due to complete during spring 2014.
The building of a link between the Crossrail and Bakerloo line platforms is a requirement of the Crossrail act and is expected to be completed in autumn 2018.
Source: Transport for London press office
What about introducing new deep-level tube trains for the Piccadilly & Bakerloo Lines that needs to replace the 1974/75 tube stocks which Siemens should start building the new Inspiro tube trains for these 2 tube lines this year (2014) and 2015 and also for the Central and Waterloo & City lines in 2015/16 that also needs new tube trains.