Heathrow Rail Access Programme

The multi-billion pound Heathrow Rail Access (HRA) programme is a Secretary of State priority and brings together the proposed Western and Southern rail links to Heathrow into a single holistic programme. These schemes seek to improve access to Heathrow Airport for both business, leisure travellers and airport workforce, by improving rail connectivity to the airport.

As part of the CP5 settlement funding was agreed to progress the Western rail link (WRLtH) through a Development Consent Order, with the aim of commencing construction work during CP6. Southern access (SRLtH) is at an earlier stage of development and funding is currently being sought to undertake a GRIP 1-2 study.

Recent work to assess the wider network capacity and capability alongside the existing Heathrow infrastructure has revealed that, given the level of services expected to be operating to Heathrow Terminal 5 by December 2019, there will be no platform availability for future HRA services. This issue could be resolved by bringing platforms 1 & 2, which are currently within a safeguarded station box at Terminal 5, into use. The options and costs for fitting out the station box at Terminal 5 have not previously been considered by the Department or Network Rail.

The purpose of this work is to provide an independent view on the cost and fit out of the station box. This is required in order to inform part of our negotiating brief for a contribution from Heathrow Airport Limited. We have been clear publicly that progressing WRLtH is dependent on agreeing an appropriate contribution from the airport and this is critical to supporting our efforts to ensure the schemes are affordable and value for money. There is a critical dependency on this work as the contribution negotiations and accompanying 'funding statement' for the scheme need to be completed in time to inform the DCO submission.