TfL confirms the Silvertown Tunnel’s opening date
London’s newest river crossing, the Silvertown Tunnel will open to road traffic on 7th April 2025, just before Easter.
Transport for London (TfL) confirmed the opening date as it announced that construction work is coming towards a close, and operational readiness testing has started ahead of the tunnel opening.
New bus routes serving the East London tunnel, which will be free for at least the first year, will also launch the same day. TfL is also installing the the new shelters and cycle racks for the zero-emission cycle-shuttle service, which will operate every 12 minutes, seven days a week from 6:30am to 9:30pm.
Work on Tidal Basin Roundabout, together with new walking and cycling routes around the roundabout and along Dock Road has also recently been completed, with work on improving Lower Lea Crossing for all road users currently underway and due to be complete by the end of spring 2025.
Allthough cyclists and, for a year, buses will be free, motorists will need to pay — with tolls being introduced on both the new Silvertown and the existing Blackwall tunnels between 6am and 10pm.
Tolls to use the Blackwall tunnel will come into effect on the same day that its neighbour the Silvertown tunnel opens — Monday 7th April 2025.
Stuart Harvey, Chief Capital Officer at Transport for London said: “I’m pleased that we can now confirm that the Silvertown Tunnel will open on 7 April 2025, following years of hard work and close collaboration between ourselves and Riverlinx Limited. The tunnel is on track to open in the coming months and is a testament to brilliant and ground-breaking engineering.”
Throughout the construction of the new tunnel, which began in 2021, more than 1,860,000 tonnes of material have been transported to and from the site via river rather than using roads. The tunnel boring machine, Jill (named after Jill Viner – London’s first female bus driver), was also turned around within the rotation chamber in Greenwich to then bore the second tunnel back towards Newham – a UK engineering first. As a project, the Silvertown Tunnel has also enabled more than 120 apprenticeships across the supply chain, as well as supported the hiring of more than 90 people who were previously unemployed and offered more than 1,500 days in placements for the next generation of engineers.
The Silvertown Tunnel project has been delivered by the Riverlinx consortium, which is made up of abrdn, Invesis, Cintra, and SK ecoplant, through a design, build, finance, operate and maintain contract. The vast majority of the funding is coming from private finance which has been specifically raised for this scheme
An off-peak rate of £1.50 will apply the majority of the time, for vehicles registered for TfL Auto Pay. To manage traffic during the busiest times, peak charges would apply, set at £1 more than standard off-peak charges for motorcycles and an extra £2.50 for cars and small vans. Large vans will pay an extra £4 and HGVs will pay an extra £5 during peak hours. These would apply for four hours northbound in the morning (from 06:00 to 10:00) and three hours southbound in the evening (from 16:00 to 19:00), Monday to Friday, or for anyone not using TfL Auto Pay.
A range of concessions and discounts will be available, including a 50 per cent discount, which will be available for low-income residents in 12 east and southeast London boroughs and the City of London:
I thought that was an odd looking air duct on the ceiling on the right but it’s actually a VERY chunky sprinkler pipe. I assume they either have a very large tank somewhere or a pipe into the thames.
Also the tunnel does look quite bendy for something done with a modern TBM.
I can’t wait to walk around Greenwich on 8th April to see how the new tunnel has dramatically reduced congestion in the area as promised! Goodbye horrendous queues!
I think not.
Adding more lanes (or in this case, roads) doesn’t reduce congestion, switching to sustainable transport does. I thought that was common knowledge by now?
Massive mistake this tunnel is. I fail to see why people vote for Sadiq Khan. He only approved it because he can get chauffeured more directly to South London from City Hall. If it was built more upstream I would definitely support it, but after all the years East London has been waiting for additional river crossings by road, we get one that comes out in the middle of nowhere on one side, and one at the same place as the Blackwall Tunnel on the other side. And then we only get a pathetic 2 new bus routes as part of the scheme. What a joke.
The tunnel was initiated by the previous mayor, Boris Johnson.
https://tfl.gov.uk/info-for/media/press-releases/2014/october/silvertown-tunnel-plans-gather-pace
Have you heard yourself?
“He only approved it because he can get chauffeured more directly to South London from City Hall”.
I think it’s time to be a bit more serious.
What on earth are you talking about? If you went much further upstream it would be Essex and Kent not East London. Silly argument. Its hardly the middle of no where?
“He only approved it because he can get chauffeured more directly to South London from City Hall”.
This is literally the stupidest take I’ve ever heard. Construction started on the tunnel before moving City Hall to The Crystal was even being discussed. Planning started years before Khan was in office. I’ve never supported Silvertown Tunnel but saying it’s all Khan’s doing is playground politics.
Like it or not, the queues and height restrictions at Blackwall mean that the new tunnel will be well used. Whether it will really “relieve pressure” elsewhere is a different matter.
Over a 12 hour period over 33,000 cyclists crossed the Thames over a central London bridge:
Hungerford Footbridge (northside) 58
Southwark Bridge 2161
Hungerford Footbridge (southside) 135
Millennium Footbridge 181
Chelsea Bridge 3749
Battersea Bridge 2012
Vauxhall Bridge 2291
Blackfriars Bridge 7057
Waterloo Bridge 3310
London Bridge 4677
Lambeth Bridge 1701
Westminster Bridge 2874
Tower Bridge 2755
Albert Bridge 640
There are no cycleable crossings of the Thames downstream of Tower Bridge (the Rotherhithe Tunnel is legally cycleable but unsafe for cycling). If the Mayor was serious about getting more cars off our roads he’d be looking at building cycleable crossings of the Thames downstream of Tower Bridge instead of gimmicky things like cycle ferries and cycle shuttle buses.
Reverting the first Blackwall Tunnel to non motor traffic only would have been a useful token.
“I took the stats from when we invite the middle classes to shut down London for a weekend to turn it into a cycletrack.” There is not that many cyclists, and if you would like more infrastructure the lycra clad middle classes should start paying for it
Couldn’t help noticing there are 3 footbridges listed as being “cyclable” and on the figures mentioned that’s 31 cyclists an hour that, from the way it reads, did not dismount for very busy pedestrian orientated bridges.