Old Oak Common station is scheduled to open in the next 5-6 years and will have a fairly regular GWR and Crossrail/Elizabeth Line service as well as of course HS2 services. It will have a service essentially rivalling Paddington's as all through services are indeed intended to stop there.
Acton Main Line is current served by 2tph TfL Rail services (currently Heathrow stoppers) with no mainline platforms. So if the Relief lines are blocked (for engineering works for instance) it sees no service. Old Oak Common station will be approximately 1 mile away from the current station with a significantly better service. Acton Mainline sees about 350,000 passengers a year (pre-Covid) which, for Zone 3 (and right next to Z2), is very poor. No doubt this is due to the both the limited service (which was even worse pre TfL Rail), the slightly awkward location (next to Acton Yard) and nearby other stations (North Action for the Central, Action Central for the Overground).
Of course there are many stations in London where 1 mile is not actually that big a difference - especially in South London - but the station has always seemed rather unloved. Now the fact that TFL have just installed a new entrance and gateline it means this is all rather unlikely but it occurs to me that the opening of OOC will not exactly cause a rush of passengers to return to Acton Mainline. There may also be some operational benefits, although they might be minor. The passenger route from the current Acton Mainline to OOC also looks fairly non-existent although the development plans might see better connections to the western side of Action.
Edit: Also when the through service runs to C. London maybe it will be more popular than Central? I will add this is not my idea, but a local friend of mine!
Acton Main Line is current served by 2tph TfL Rail services (currently Heathrow stoppers) with no mainline platforms. So if the Relief lines are blocked (for engineering works for instance) it sees no service. Old Oak Common station will be approximately 1 mile away from the current station with a significantly better service. Acton Mainline sees about 350,000 passengers a year (pre-Covid) which, for Zone 3 (and right next to Z2), is very poor. No doubt this is due to the both the limited service (which was even worse pre TfL Rail), the slightly awkward location (next to Acton Yard) and nearby other stations (North Action for the Central, Action Central for the Overground).
Of course there are many stations in London where 1 mile is not actually that big a difference - especially in South London - but the station has always seemed rather unloved. Now the fact that TFL have just installed a new entrance and gateline it means this is all rather unlikely but it occurs to me that the opening of OOC will not exactly cause a rush of passengers to return to Acton Mainline. There may also be some operational benefits, although they might be minor. The passenger route from the current Acton Mainline to OOC also looks fairly non-existent although the development plans might see better connections to the western side of Action.
Edit: Also when the through service runs to C. London maybe it will be more popular than Central? I will add this is not my idea, but a local friend of mine!
Last edited:
