Dave Arquati wrote:

Aidan Stanger wrote:
Peter Masson wrote:
"Aidan Stanger" wrote

driving forward the Docklands Light Railway,
Including an extension under the Thames which will be virtually emptied
once a more direct route is built.

Will it? Even if Crossrail is completed at the earliest possible date, DLR
will have several years head start to Woolwich Arsenal. Current plans for
Crossrail do not include any station between Custom House and Abbey Wood,
and the only possibility is remote from Woolwich Arsenal station/town
centre. Woolwich town centre must be an important traffic objective.
Crossrail is also unlikely to have a station at City Airport, so the best
route from South East London/Thames Gateway to there will be via Woolwich
Arsenal and DLR.

My guess is that Crossrail plans were manipulated to justify the DLR
extension. Why else would they miss out an important traffic objective
and a cheap station?

Since when were deep-tube heavy rail stations cheap?

City Airport could be served by building a cheap station on the surface,
on the straight track section slightly E of the present Silvertown
station.

I didn't claim they'd be able to build the Woolwich station cheaply.

Having said that, it just might be possible to do so by using the
existing (upgraded) Woolwich Arsenal station, as the earlier proposals
for a Woolwich tunnel did before Crossrail was involved. I do not have
enough information to say that CLRL are definitely wrong when they say
it can't be done, but they have been so obvioulsy wrong about other
things that it wouldn't surprise me at all.

--
Aidan Stanger
http://www.bettercrossrail.co.uk