Crossrail Update
Crossrail enters 2021 with more money to spend, a sparkling (but still unused) Farringdon station and a doubling of trains undergoing tunnel manoeuvres.
December saw another funding crisis resolved but, once again, only at the very last minute and after warnings from London’s Transport Commissioner Andy Byford that sites might have to be mothballed if the project’s contractors could not see a direct line to being paid.
Crossrail’s latest shortfall has been left dangling over the project for months. The last time the Government agreed to revise the funding package was December 2018. In November 2019 Crossrail parent Transport for London advised the stock exchange that it would need another £400 million but by August 2020 the Crossrail board reported it could need up to £1.1 billion to complete work on the scheme. Taken with a series of increases to the cost of Network Rail Crossrail programme works this threatened to take the cost of delivering Elizabeth Line infrastructure to well over £19 billion.
