Over the Easter break, one of Europe’s largest cranes was at work in Clapham Junction reaching over the railway tracks to help instal a new footbridge staircase.
(c) Network Rail
As part of a project to upgrade the Brighton Yard entrance to Clapham Junction station, they’ve been working on the footbridge as well, and it was decided that the existing stairs leading to platforms 13 and 14 needed to be made larger.
The platforms are busy as that’s generally where the Brighton mainline trains call, so lots of people swapping between platforms, and the existing staircase up to the footbridge was straining to cope.
The wider set of stairs, a third wider than the current set was installed over Easter.
However to get the old stairs out and the new ones in quickly, rather than breaking up the old staircase into pieces, it was decided to lift it out in two pieces, and that required the large crane.
The crane also reversed the job, hoisting in the replacement larger staircase.
The first section of the staircase is removed (c) Network Rail
Lucy McAuliffe, Network Rail’s Sussex route director, said: “It’s fantastic to see the progress the teams have made over the Easter weekend across the Sussex region.
“At Clapham Junction, the new staircase will mean more comfortable journeys for passengers especially those using busy platforms 13 and 14 which serve passengers travelling on Southern services to and from London Victoria and the south coast.
“The work down in Streatham also sees the last of nine major junction rebuilds which have been delivered as part of the two year, £160m investment in track and signalling on the lines between Balham, Clapham Junction and London Victoria as part of the London Victoria resignalling programme.”
Engineers also worked over the Easter closure to renew a set of outdated switches and crossings at Streatham North Junction, just to the north of Streatham Common station.
