London Bridge

Featured in the Future Transport London Newsletter October 2026

Thameslink services began in 1988, with the reopening of the link between Farringdon and Blackfriars, but the present scheme was committed in 1996, when Railtrack was given £600 million to build upgrades allowing up to 24 trains per hour. The upgrades finally opened in May 2018 with trains, signalling and stations much changed since 1988 or even 1996, but after a poor start until crews from different operators were integrated, Thameslink has gone from strength to strength.

The trains have open gangways and wide doors for faster alighting and boarding.

The signalling, the world’s first application of Automatic Train Operation (ATO) on the European Train Control System (ETCS) allows trains to drive automatically with very short spaces between them and full protection from driver error.

One station, however, is beginning to run into problems: London Bridge, which was completely rebuilt within its constrained site between Tooley Street and St Thomas Street in time for the May 2018 timetable. In April 2026, Modern Railways reported that ‘The revamped London Bridge has become a victim of its own success, with interchanging passengers crowding the escalators’.

Before upgrading, passengers would hog the parts of the platforms protected by canopies from rain, and performance was worse on rainy days. There was, however, natural segregation of terminating and interchanging passengers. The former had level entry to the terminating platforms and ramps up to the through platforms. The latter could use an overbridge, around 3-3.5 metres above the tracks, connecting all the platforms.

Upgrading introduced full-length canopies, but all passengers using the through platforms must use the stairs, escalators and lifts connecting the centre of the platforms to the concourse, 12 metres or over 60 steps below. Terminating passengers travel either down or up, and interchange passengers travel both down and up. Congestion around the escalators worsens if one fails and passengers have to use stairs in one direction. Congestion around the lifts grows as accessibility improvements elsewhere mean that more passengers travel with wheelchairs, buggies, luggage or dogs.

Adding overbridges between the platforms would spoil the view of the station roof from the Shard, but they need be only just above the trains, could be placed to draw interchanging passengers away from the congested centre of the platforms, and would relieve the escalators and stairs.

Adding lift capacity may be harder. The current lifts are situated where the platforms squeeze around the escalators and stairs, and passengers using them up to the platforms emerge into a small area which can be busy with passengers waiting to go down. There is, however, no obvious location for more lifts.

It is disappointing that an impressive and expensive station is beginning to face congestion problems within a decade of opening. It is disconcerting that, with the station already tightly packed into a constrained site, any expansion needed is likely to be difficult and expensive.

Dick Dunmore