Inside London’s £18BN New Railway

hello from what will become the Tottenham Court Road station on the new Elizabeth Line being built by cross rail across London now the challenges of cross rail are well known the scheme is going to be around two and a half years late and over two billion pounds over budgets it's right that we learn from that to ensure it doesn't happen again but I guess looking beyond the construction phase what awaits Londoners is shorter journey times better connections an economic boost and a station down here at top and Court Road that's unlike anything I've seen before extending over a hundred kilometres cross rail is constructing the Elizabeth line across London from Reading and Heathrow in the West beneath the centre of the city and out to Shenfield and Abbey wood in the east with 41 new and upgraded stations and over 42 kilometres of new tunnels under one of the world's most historic and densely occupied cities the project is by far the largest undertaking in Europe and despite its delays and cost overruns the projects eighteen billion pound final construction costs is likely to be offset by the 42 billion pounds it adds to the UK economy the central section of the Elizabeth lines routes which passes through the heart of the city is the most complex and the building of new tunnels and stations has often had to contend with surrounding structures and other projects taking place above the cross rail team sites now the new station here at Tomica Road in fact has two entrances one under a new plaza in front of Centrepointe at the eastern end and another here on Dean Street at the western end now those two entrances to this station have been designed to look different to fit in with their surrounding context to fit in with those parts of London here at the western end you can see it's slightly darker internally to fit in with the surrounding nocturnal economies the nightlife that were sure many of you familiar with here at this part of London here at the eastern entrance the top macaw trove you can see there's a bit of a different feel as compared to what we found over at Dean Street just a moment ago there's even this artwork on the wall which is actually a secret map of this part of London so this here is Soho Square this is the Dean Street entrance Tottenham Court Road and there's other stations and landmarks and basically the city kind of map built into the artwork here on the wall in topicort Road station on the Elizabeth Line something you wouldn't really know unless someone told you [Music] so Li Ling how long have been involved on the cross rail station product and what's her role in this game so I've actually been on the cross rail project since 2009 and I've really seen my career progressed in that time I started off as a cost engineer I was the Lu interface manager for a while I became the MEP package manager taught me road field engineering supervisor supervisors rep and actually now I'm the project manager for Tottenham Court Road station for cross rail what's what's been the hardest part of the station build down here at Suffolk or Road oh good grief well I've been really lucky in order to be able to see one whole part of cross rail going from demolition to what you see now I've seen the tunnel boring machines come through the tunnel boring machines when they came to the Tottenham Court Road came very close to within the toes of one of the piles and they had to do that operation over the live operational Northern Line so that was a very very critical exercise but actually I think tunnel boring machine sorry tunnel is is quite straightforward because you're the master or the mistress of your own destiny I think now is one of the most complicated times because when Tottenham Court Road station for the Elizabeth line opens it will actually be part of the existing Tottenham Court Road station which is the North line than the central line so this face that the systems and then testing this is more difficult than building a huge title under London yep in my view that is the case you've been involved here for 11 years now what's it going to feel like when that day comes when you see the first people walking on these corn houses and using the station well it's gonna be amazing I think everyone who's involved on cross rail feels such ownership and such pride about what we're achieving I mean we're building something that's going to be lasting for at least 120 years it's going to be amazing and I think Londoners and anybody else from around the world when they ride cross rail when they ride the Elizabeth mine they will be blown away at this amazing world-class project do you find that the delays in the cost overruns is that kind of taking the edge off for you has it been more difficult to be proud of the project because of that absolutely not of course we were very disappointed when we were unable to open in December 18 I don't think that I understood the complexity of what we had left to do I sincerely had thought at that time that between us we could make it work but there has been a huge amount of assurance that we need to produce because it doesn't matter how good a job you do if you can't demonstrate that you've done the right thing you've built to the right standard you've built to the right specification then it's it's worthless there's a lot of young people watching trying to work out what they want to do with their lives there's a lot of people in other industries fed up with their jobs what's the best thing about your job why do you why do you do this every day people people think that engineering or construction is all about mud and dirt of machines and technical and yes there is that aspect of it but to build an amazing mega project like the Elizabeth mine takes people and frankly it's the bringing together of people it's the teamwork the camaraderie the technical solutions and agreeing of those all disagreeing and bringing all of those people together in order to deliver something amazing to me is one of the most fulfilling pieces about my job the new station down here at top McCourt Road really is impressive yes cross rails had its challenges we're all familiar with that but we must know the overshadow what's actually being achieved down here you know where I'm walking used to be solid earth and now it's a major station on a major new railway that's going to make a huge difference to millions people's lives and the economy of this country people like Li Ling and her team's do stuff like this every day that's the power of construction that's the impact it can have not just on people but on whole cities and whole countries economies it really is the coolest industry in the world as ever guys if you enjoyed this video make sure you subscribe um and we'll see you soon [Music]

Channel: The B1M

Views: 1,341,281

Rating: 4.9147801 out of 5

Keywords: B1M, TheB1M, Construction, architecture, engineering, The B1M, Fred Mills, building, infrastructure, crossrail, HS2, elizabeth line, hyperloop, high speed rail, norways $47BN coastal highway, tunnel, tunnelling, London, UK, texas high speed rail, california high speed rail, new york metro, londonist, Crossrail Project, UK rail, metro, london underground, TFL, transport for london

Id: swSeHxk9TGI

Length: 7min 5sec (425 seconds)

Published: Sun Mar 08 2020

Reddit Comments

[u/nokiab0mb]

The tube in and out of Tottenham Court Road station is nuts. 85cm from the live Northern Line platforms and 35cm from station escalators. Impressive feat of engineering.

[u/SomeWitticism]

Let me say on behalf of all American urbanists:

[u/rustybeancake]

This was the biggest construction project in Europe a few years back. It's a mindbogglingly complex project.

[u/kaozennrk]

From someone who is just learning of this project- wow, that's impressive!

[u/MrAronymous]

The finishes look top-notch.