Transport for London’s Christmas present to south-east London was to announce that it is dusting off its plans for an extension of the Bakerloo line to Lewisham, and potentially beyond to Beckenham Junction and Elmers End.

Going underground: an extension to a 120-year Tube line could be a massive boost for south-east London

The capital’s transport authority slipped out the news on Christmas Eve, saying that the Tube line extension to an area poorly served by links into central London is intended “to improve transport connections in south-east London and to enable growth in homes and jobs”.

Significantly, the proposals include an extension beyond Lewisham which would provide a Tube link to Croydon’s trams at Elmers End and Beckenham Junction, effectively book-ending south London’s transport infrastructure which interchanges with the Tube’s District line at Wimbledon in the west.

But don’t get too excited just yet: the Bakerloo extension has already been subject to public consultations in 2014, 2017 and 2019. TfL says that five years ago, nearly 9,000 responded to its consultation then, and 89% of them “made positive or supportive comments about our proposals”.

There was also strong support – 82% – for a possible further extension to Hayes and Beckenham Junction.

The talk of a Tube extension remains, however, a City Hall spitballing exercise for the time being. Work on the initial extension, from the Elephant and Castle (Getting a new ticket hall! Yay!) down the Old Kent Road (making a reality of the Monopoly board) to Lewisham would not begin before the 2030s.

And then there’s money.

“A viable funding package is needed to build the Bakerloo line extension,” TfL says in a footnote to its latest posting. “We’ll continue discussions with the government while being realistic about the funding London could contribute to an extension over the coming years.”

Down the Old Kent Road: TfL has plumped for its route to Lewisham

Note that: “realistic”.

The extension from the Elephant to Lewisham could cost up to £8.7billion. The additional extension into Bromley is estimated to cost another £2billion. Two companies were appointed by TfL in October to complete feasibility studies on the extension, and are due to report back in June.

Originally established as the Baker Street and Waterloo Railway, the Bakerloo line opened in 1906 and today carries more than 125million passengers annually. But its rolling stock, dating from 1972, are the oldest trains in regular passenger service in Britain.

So TfL’s Bakerloo extension plans include new trains, which are being made to the same specification as the replacement rolling stock for the Piccadilly line.

Siemens in Yorkshire is building the Piccadilly line trains, 94 of them, the first of which arrived in London in the autumn and which all should be in service by 2028. Their introduction has been delayed because of TfL’s cashflow issues following the covid lockdown.

TfL is spending about £3billion on the Piccadilly line upgrade, which is £62million over budget.

In its announcement this week about the Bakerloo line extension, TfL said: “An extension of the line to Lewisham via the Old Kent Road and New Cross Gate has been chosen as the best option…

Old trains: the Bakerloo line’s rolling stock are the oldest trains in service in Britain

“We are also considering a second phase of the extension beyond Lewisham to Hayes and Beckenham Junction. This would involve converting the National Rail line via Catford to Hayes to a London Underground operation.

“The route would have a frequent Tube service, improving journey times for customers and offering better connections within south-east London, and into central London.”

As well as upgrading the century-old station at the Elephant, TfL’s proposals include two new stations (Burgess Park and Old Kent Road), as well as creating “a new station at New Cross Gate to provide better connectivity to National Rail, Overground and buses”.

The station at Lewisham would also interconnect with the Docklands Light Railway (which is also undergoing an upgrade and getting new rolling stock at present).

It had long been considered that, at least for funding reasons, any Bakerloo extension beyond Lewisham would only happen after the first phase was completed. But it appears that TfL is thinking more ambitiously.

Beyond Lewisham, TfL thinks it can transform transport provision by taking over existing railway lines.

Beckenham beckoning: TfL would take over existing rail lines to upgrade services from Bromley

In a Freedom of Information response to questions about the takeover of the Southeastern services, TfL said: “The start of construction works on the Bakerloo line extension is subject to the provision of planning and adequate funding being available, with construction timescales including any closure of the line also subject to further design development.

“It is currently anticipated that work on an extension could begin in the early 2030s and, assuming the Hayes extension was built in parallel to the Lewisham extension.” This appears to be a significant acceleration of the extension process.

“It is estimated that work affecting Southeastern trains would begin around five years into the wider Bakerloo line extension construction programme,” TfL said in their FoI response.

When the Bakerloo trains arrive in south-east London, they will be coming at a rate of one almost every two minutes: “27 trains per hour on the core section of the line between Queens Park and Lewisham, with at least 18 trains per hour extended south of Lewisham on to the Hayes branch. Of these, at least 12 trains per hour would serve Hayes, with the remaining six trains per hour serving Beckenham Junction”, TfL says.

“This would provide a train at least every five minutes from Hayes and every 10 minutes from Beckenham Junction.”

And it might even be all completed and in service before Westfield finish their regeneration of Croydon town centre. Now there’s a thought…

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