Bridge to Nowhere: six months after the link to Cherry Orchard Road was finally completed, Croydon Council’s ‘planning’ failures and Network Rail budgets mean that the East Croydon Station bridge can still not be completed
After 11 years and at least £22m of public money, it now turns out that the organisations responsible for the pedestrian bridge at the northern end of East Croydon Station don’t have the readies to finally complete the project, as JERRY FITZPATRICK explains
Let’s begin with a timeline to refresh our memories:
April 2010: Six Prime Ministers ago. £20million taxpayer-funded project is announced to build a footbridge across East Croydon Station: £14million from Network Rail and £6million from Croydon Council (the costs would rise towards £22million by the time of near-completion). Seen as a key point of borough masterplan to form the basis of the area’s regeneration. The objective: to relieve pressure on the station front entrance and to provide an easier route into the town centre for people living in Addiscombe.
The public were assured that, subject to planning permission, the bridge would open in 2013.
October 2010: Menta boss Craig Marks proposed a scheme for a 53-storey tower block overlooking on Cherry Orchard Road, overlooking East Croydon Station, and announced he would take responsibility for providing the link to the new station bridge. In due course, he entered a Section 106 agreement with Croydon Council.
2013: The bridge was part-constructed. The eastern link was conspicuous by its absence. Inside Croydon dubbed it “the Bridge to Nowhere”. The name has stuck.
2013 to 2024: Menta has built residential six tower blocks along Cherry Orchard Road and one block providing affordable and social housing on the other side of the road. The 53-storey tower was abandoned some time ago.
2023: Marks announced that he had commissioned the construction of the bridge link to Cherry Orchard Road.
March 2024: the link is ready to attach to the rest of the bridge.
Yet the bridge is no closer to being opened.
The annual meeting of the East Croydon Community Organisation was scheduled for July 16. Croydon Council, Menta and Network Rail accepted invitations to answer questions from the community. From Croydon Council, Heather Cheesbrough, the head of planning, and Owen Thompson of the regeneration team. From Menta, senior manager Richard Lewis. From Network Rail, Robbie Lough, project manager of the East Croydon scheme and Harry Stevenson, a manager in the comms team.
Almost 100 ECCO members gathered at Christ Church Methodist Church in Lower Addiscombe Road. I provided some questions in advance to the speakers to ensure they cut quickly to the chase. The two main obstacles to the bridge being completed were quickly established:
- The link needs to be attached. No party has yet to take financial and legal liability for this
- After 11 years of disuse, considerable maintenance work has to be done to the bridge to make it safe. After that, one party must take liability for ongoing maintenance
Network Rail said that the extensive bridge maintenance work had been put out to tender, but that the quotations which had been returned were higher than they were prepared to pay.
The contract for the work would be retendered. No date had been fixed for doing that. Network Rail conceded that at the very earliest, the issue would not be resolved until well into 2025.
There was no satisfactory answer as to why the parties had not previously acted to address maintenance issues and resolve the issue of ongoing legal and financial liability.
Both Croydon Council and Network Rail highlighted the cost of the work to be done. The parties repeated that they were regularly engaging in cordial talks. But as for one party picking up the tab for ongoing financial responsibility, there was silence.
Left hanging: 11 years after the ‘grand’ opening of the bridge at Caithness Walk, the eastern end still cannot be completed
Both Croydon Council and Network Rail acknowledged that communication with the public had been “inadequate”. They would, they promised, do better in future.
I now asked a question which an ECCO member who couldn’t attend had submitted. Would the bridge link provide access to the station with ticket gates?
When I saw the question, it didn’t seem worth asking. The project was conceived with the very purpose of providing access to the station.
The answer from Network Rail was a bombshell. They could not afford ticket gates. So there wouldn’t be access to the station.
There we have it. A £24million capital project, in which Menta were allowed to go 11 years before they provided the essential bridge link. Meanwhile, Network Rail fail to take action over the maintenance of the bridge, and Croydon Council and Network Rail fail to resolve issues which should have been anticipated, such as ongoing responsibilities for maintenance. And they can give no undertaking about when such issues will be resolved.
The final insult added to the community injury: the main purpose of the bridge, to give the people of East Croydon and Addiscombe access to the station, quietly, secretively abandoned. Inadequate communication indeed.
It might be reasonable to think that the rail service provider – Govia Thameslink – would fund the provision of ticket gates. But rail passengers have little hope of anything from GTR. Perhaps nationalisation may lead to more effective joined-up decision-making? In the meantime, we are all left hanging, much like the Bridge to Nowhere these past 11 years…
Menta has belatedly done its bit, other than resolving (with the other parties) responsibility for the linkage of their final piece to the bridge.
As for Network Rail and Croydon Council, they will continue to talk very nicely to each other. They may even keep us better informed of what they are discussing. As the benchmarks have been so lamentably low, this is a promise easy to fulfil. But don’t hold your breath. And prepare to be surprised if their splendidly cordial talks lead to early positive action.
When the bridge project was announced in 2010, Croydon Council’s cabinet member responsible for planning, conservation and climate change was Jason Perry. He gave the scheme his full support: “This a truly exciting initiative that will be enormously valuable to everyone using East Croydon Station and will help stimulate further development in the area.”
Perhaps the now Mayor Jason Perry can bring the project to a speedy, and complete, fruition?
- Jerry Fitzpatrick is a former Labour councillor for Addiscombe West ward
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How many times does Heather Cheesborough’s name have to appear on these pages before someone does something about her? She’s not alone in her responsibility for what IC has described as a ‘clusterfuck’ – and much of this pre-dates her time in Croydon – but she has taken Croydon planning from dire to disastrous and she will never hold developers to account (and I doubt they take her very seriously anyway given her reputation).
It’s not just us that says that Cheesbrough’s at the centre of an omnishambles.
But we have also chronicled how she has appointed senior planners who are waaaay too close to private developer interests.
What a farce, what’s the point in the bridge unless it gives direct access to the station. Perhaps the local MP, Natasha Irons can make herself useful and press the Department for Transport to fund ticket machines. It doesn’t seem unreasonable to invest a little in one of the busiest stations in the country. For comparison Clapham Junction has only slightly more annual entries/exits than East Croydon and yet got funding to have 11 ticket barriers.
From the u-turn to add two platforms to East Croydon, to continuing to be in Zone 5, Croydon is always overlooked. The infrastructure improvement of the station is critical to the improvement of central Croydon.
I cant digest the £22m price tag! Wtf. Is someone buying hotels in Mayfair? #monopolymoney
I have a £150m council office building, one not-so-careful owner, I can flog to you if you’re interested
Jerry Fitzpatrick knows perfectly well that Mayor Jason Perry isn’t going to fix this. He has neither the ability nor the inclination.
This scandal does present the new MP for the area, Natasha Irons, with the opportunity to show her mettle, and do better than the previous incumbents
I have a slight feeling that Jerry was being ironic or sarcastic…..but it was a terrific artcle whatever..
From Jason Perry’s appalling record of non-achievement since he has been in (part-time) office it is clear that the only thing he might be capable of bringing to fruition is
…..well, I thought there was something……absolutely nothing. In that he has a 100% record!
The bridge opening being delayed yet again is quite hilarious and not totally unexpected given the history.
Not adding ticket barriers on the Addiscombe Road side is highly questionable and should be raised to the local MP if NR won’t play ball. I would be very surprised if the original design (which would have been used to secure funding for the bridge) did not already include a ticket barrier. Hence this would have been included in the budget at the time and should be investigated.
I suspect this is part of the wider commercial issue re. maintenance between Menta and NR. NR possibly using it as a bargaining chip – at the detriment of the local community.
I had to check the date just to make sure this wasn’t an April fool joke. You can enter the station from the Dingwall Road end of this bridge, complete with ticket machines, but not from the other end? I can’t even begin to imagine how the bridge will connect but prevent people from entering the station ticket machines or not. Presumably that’s why there’s a spare part bridge lying around somewhere gently moldering away. Oh dear oh dear!
No, Mayor Perry is too busy opening cake shops
And the trees planted between the buildings at the base of the steps are slowly dying due to lack of water. The trees on the first floor roof have just about had it, too. Britain sure knows how to pi** vast amounts of money up against the wall. Easy come, easy go.
Usually there’s something in the small print of the planning permission saying something like any trees that die in the first 5 years have to be replaced. That never happens
Not just that, but two trees are planted under the canopy the tops of them touching the underside, no room for vertical growth, perhaps there’s a perfectly sound explantion for this.