Last month we reported how the Elizabeth Line was facing a further delay and further cost rises. Details of how serious these are have now been shared by the Crossrail board as it waits to hear how the programme sponsors intend to bridge the funding gap.
That gap has got wider and seems to have gained another digit. On 8 November 2019 we heard Crossrail was likely to need between £400 million and £650 million more than the finance package hammered out between the Department for Transport and Transport for London, the Crossrail programme sponsors, in December 2018. The latest cost estimate presented to the Crossrail board shows the cost to complete could be up to £1.1 billion above the agreed budget – that’s £450 million more than the upper range of the additional money we were told last year that the project would need.
