Paddington Station after Crossrail

[Flinn Reed]

Once Crossrail services are running the full length through the central core, will this affect GWR services at Paddington. 6tph of TFL Rail services will no longer terminate at Paddington, freeing up platform space for terminating trains, and this could increase further in the future if Crossrail were to additionally take over the Heathrow Express. Will there be any GWR capacity increases or significant timetable changes, to make use of this additional platform space at Paddington? Or at least, will there be changes to the platforms used for each GWR service at Paddington, with the TFL Rail platforms vacant?

 

[30907]

IIRC HEX lost a platform in order to accommodate the temporary Crossrail service, so the arrangements presumably will revert. There are no spare paths in the peak anyway.
If HEX were in the future replaced by additional Crossrails AND these were able to use the Relief Lines then there would be additional paths.

 

[Stephen1001]

My experience of travelling into Paddington is that space is very much at a premium as things are. On inbound services it's almost inevitable to have a (sometimes fairly lengthy) wait outside the station for a platform. So even assuming no new services are introduced, the extra flexibility will be welcome from a punctuality point of view. If journey times can be reduced by removing some of the recovery time, so much the better - there are currently trains timed 13 minutes from Ealing Broadway non-stop when it should only need 7.

 

[Railwaysceptic]

Platform availability at Paddington is not the only constraint on the GWML. The relief lines are also at capacity during the peak periods and the Crossrail trains use them between Acton and Reading.

 

[CW2]

The trains with extended journey times between Ealing Broadway and Paddington tend to be overnight or weekends at times when a 2-track timetable is in operation. There is a standard [1] engineering allowance after Ealing Broadway to cope with engineering work anywhere in the vicinity. Paddington has a 6-track bi-directional throat, so there is plenty of flexibility there. Platform occupation is indeed the main constraint for normal daytime services.