ISSUE 5 | AUGUST 2014 LIVERPOOL STREET Crossrail works in your neighbourhood At our Blomfield site, we’ve excavated the BACK ON WELCOME main shaft down to 17 metres and at Finsbury TRACK I’m pleased to Circus my colleagues, under Colin Niccolls, announce that the have finished excavating and enlarging the Welcome to Crossrail project has platform tunnels, to allow our Tunnel Boring On Track, the now passed the Machines (TBMs), Elizabeth and Victoria, local newsletter halfway stage. I that updates you to come through in early 2015. Finally, at hope some of you on progress at Moorgate, we’ve excavated the main shaft Liverpool Street. managed to attend down to 30 metres and we hope to reach the our Halfway There bottom, at 55 metres below ground, by the Twice a year, On Track events, which were held to show the will let you know end of the year. public what’s going on behind the hoardings. what Crossrail has We can’t build this been doing in your If not, don’t worry, there will be other events area and what’s planned for this autumn. mega-project without the continued support coming up, so that It’s been a hectic 10 months since the last of our neighbours, you can see how we issue! We’ve relocated an existing London are building a Underground substation from under Liverpool business partners, the world- class railway City of London, London near you. Street, completed a new utility corridor which allows us to divert all the existing utilities Underground, Network Copies of On Track away from the middle of Liverpool Street itself Rail, Transport for are sent to residents and reopened the Liverpool Street bus station London and all of the and businesses near after finishing works in Old Broad Street. utility companies. So a Colin Niccolls our Liverpool Street very big thank you all Project Manager station works. It is These milestones mean that we can now for your cooperation Finsbury Circus also available online move on to start building the new eastern and patience during and at our Visitor ticket hall substructure 20 metres below these works. Information Centre ground. With Old Broad Street open again we (details on the back can also undertake the final round of utility Troy Easthorpe page). diversions in Blomfield Street. Project Manager NEW POWER TO MEET WORKS UPDATE BROADGATE TICKET HALL Worksite NEW NEEDS As part of the enabling works for Crossrail’s BLOMFIELD STREET Works have been underway since the beginning of the year at Moorgate and Blomfield Street. Worksite Liverpool Street eastern ticket hall, the existing Shaft construction will be completed by 2015 and progress is currently halfway through on the electricity substation which lies within the Moorgate shaft, the Blomfield box and a shaft that has lain dormant for more than footprint of the ticket hall needed to be 10 years below Moor House. relocated and replaced. BLOMFIELD BOX The substation provides equipment, electricity and services to the Central line and Liverpool After Laing O’Rourke has begun piling works to form the foundations for the 40-metre deep Street underground station as well as Blomfield box shaft, works will begin on the main excavation of what will be the deepest pile communications and signalling needs. shaft on Crossrail. This phase of work is expected to last eight months, during which time 18,000 cubic metres of material will be excavated – that’s almost 36 tonnes in weight. The ELDON STREET The design and building of a new substation The new cable tunnel Moor House shaft material will be shipped out to become part of the RSPB wildlife reserve that is being created FINSBURY CIRCUS has been challenging. It involved seamlessly Worksite transferring power from the old to the at Wallasea Island, Essex. LONDON W new one, without losing or compromising The shaft will connect with the platform tunnels below and allow for the fit out of mechanical services. A new cable/service tunnel under and electrical services. The major structural works for the Blomfield box are expected to be the Metropolitan, Central and Hammersmith completed by mid-2015 and will require the installation of some 2,000 tonnes of steel and ALL & Circle lines was put in place and tested 9,000 cubic metres of concrete to create the strong shaft structure. while still maintaining a fully operational MOORGATE SHAFT underground station. Local residents may have heard the noise The Moorgate site has been going through some major changes over the year, as Crossrail is as the roof was removed from the old moving into the excavation and construction of the shaft which will ultimately provide access substation. The team at the Broadgate site to the 250-metre long underground platforms, as well as being used for ventilation and storing has worked hard to ensure their duties were mechanical and electrical equipment for the new Crossrail Liverpool Street station. completed safely and with minimal disruption Plant removed as Local residents and the general public have had the opportunity to visit the site for MOORGATE to the people living, visiting or working in presentations on, and viewings of, the shaft while works continue. At the beginning of the year, the area. over 300 local residents from the Barbican came to see what goes on behind the hoardings and MOORGATE The new substation has been built with more what all the noise is about. Many were pleased to see the progress. Worksite capacity to meet future needs of Crossrail One resident said it was “… a wonderful opportunity to see the construction of a mammoth and London Underground station lines. It is undertaking that will affect all our lives here in the City”. MOOR HOUSE now completed and supplying all necessary services to underground station lines at Demolition of internal walls within The westbound platform tunnel up to Moorgate was completed in March and over the next six Aerial photo of the Liverpool Street area the Queen Victoria Tunnel Liverpool Street station. The new electricity substation Excavations underway at months Crossrail continues the process of excavation and tunnel building in readiness for the showing Crossrail worksites the Blomfield box westbound TBM Victoria to come through the shaft towards the end of 2014. 40-metre deep, 8 metres in diameter, that the shaft and tunnel are built to Moor House Moor going on… shaft was sunk in the basement of last for the next 120 years. was designed with Blomfield box: Below Moor House is a shaft that has the building. Crossrail in mind view from below been waiting 10 years for the rest of The works will be completed by Earlier this year, Crossrail’s contractors, Liverpool Street station to take shape. September 2014 in readiness for the Laing O’Rourke took possession of Moor House was the first building the shaft and have been making eastbound TBM Elizabeth to come to be designed with Crossrail in preparations to install an in situ through on its way to Farringdon. mind. Completed in 2004, the piled concrete lining. The lining is necessary The shaft will then be incorporated foundations of the building reach to prepare for the tunnel breakthrough into the tunnel ventilation systems down 57 metres and are specifically which will be undertaken by Crossrail being constructed for the eastbound designed to withstand the Crossrail contractors BBMV in readiness to Compensation grouting tubes running tunnel. at Finsbury Circus Blomfield box: view from above tunnelling in the area. As a condition construct the platform. It also meets of the planning permission, a the criteria set by Crossrail to ensure Moorgate shaft Tony Goble MEET THE CONTRACTORS Project Manager BBMV JV The construction works being undertaken on Crossrail Liverpool Street station are huge and span multiple sites Balfour Beatty/Alpine BeMo from Old Broad Street to Moorfields. It means works are Tunnelling/Morgan Sindall/Vinci carried out by a range of contractors and sub-contractors. Joint Venture (BBMV JV) is on Some of Crossrail’s contractors you may have met: site at Finsbury Circus where the future station’s platform tunnels Rob Scheele are being excavated. Project Manager Taylor Woodrow Taylor Woodrow is working on a Ewan Barr section of the Broadgate ticket Project Manager BNK JV hall site on Liverpool Street. Their works are mainly associated with BAM Nuttall Kier Joint Venture utility diversions which are now (BNK JV) works are well almost complete. underway at the western end constructing the Moorgate shaft. Malcolm Nelson Project Director Laing O’Rourke Laing O’Rourke is working at Other works are being undertaken on behalf of Crossrail by both the Blomfield box site UK Power Networks and London Underground, including off Blomfield Street and the fitting out the station. There is still much to do before the Broadgate ticket hall. They will new Crossrail is completed in 2019. eventually take possession of all sites at Liverpool Street. The graveyard was built on FINDING THE PAST the vegetable patch at Bethlem Hospital Following on from the significant archaeological finds at Liverpool Street in the 1560s to take overflow from last year, Crossrail are planning a further archaeological investigation of London’s cemeteries the site starting in October. During work to relocate local utilities, archaeologists have had tantalising glimpses into the past. The site at Liverpool Street has uncovered a rich deposit of archaeology and provides an intriguing insight into London’s history over the last 2,000 years including the Bedlam burial ground where over 2,000 burials were found. As utility works come to an end, archaeologists will step back in. The first phase of their works will include removing 200 burials from the site by carefully excavating each intact skeleton so that they can be reburied with care and respect.