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FCC, through Alpine, its subsidiary for Cen-
tral and Eastern Europe, is working one of
the major landmarks of the United Kingdom
and all of Europe: Crossrail, a project con-
sisting in the construction of a 119 km-long
infrastructure for a commuter train and 37
stations.
Crossrail will run from Maidenhead and
Heathrow, in West London, to Shenfield
and Abbey Wood in East London. The sec-
tions through the centre of London and the
connection to Heathrow Airport, a total of
21 kilometres, will be underground while
the remaining twenty-eight stops along the
route will be at ground level.
When it opens in 2018, an additional 1.5
million people will be able to travel to bu-
siness areas in 25% and capacity in the
British capital’s railway transport system
will increase by 10%. In short, this pro-
ject represents the most important tunnel
construction in the United Kingdom since
the Jubilee underground and the Channel
Tunnel Rail Link.
The enormous London Crossrail project
was considered 100 years ago and a se-
rious proposal was made for the first time in
the 1980s. Nevertheless, the Governments
were wary because of the huge costs in-
volved. In the huge cost involved. London’s
relentless growth and the pressures on its
public transport system finally led the £14.8
billion project to start in 2007.
The trains will run from Reading to
Shenfield and Abbey Wood
Crossrail will be linking railway lines that at
present terminate on the edges of central
London to provide a through service under
the UK capital’s heart.
Trains will run from Reading to Shenfield
and Abbey Wood, linking Heathrow airport
and the skyscrapers of Canary Wharf.
Alpine is working on two stations contem-
plated in the project as part of BBMV – a
long-established partnership with Balfour
Beatty, Morgan Sindall and Vinci: the exca-
vation of stations at Liverpool Street, in the
City of London, and at Whitechapel in the
historic East End.
The former is in the main financial district,
but Whitechapel, though barely 20 minutes’
walk away, is quite different. This is the old
East End, where outsiders’ images persist
of cheerful Cockneys talking in rhyming
slang while dressed in pearly costumes; a
place once associated with the notorious
Jack The Ripper and the Kray twins, and
with popular television shows from Till
Death Us Do Part to Eastenders.
This district is changing rapidly. Whitecha-
pel has been home to successive waves
of immigration, most recently from Bangla-
desh, and colourful market stalls of Asian
clothes and fresh produce and the exten-
ded Royal London Hospital impart an air of
busy activity. Whitechapel station is already
served by London’s Underground and
Overground lines, and Crossrail will turn it
into an important interchange, making the
area much more attractive.
On a very constricted site near Whitechapel
market, engineers are at work on the Cros-
srail station, which will be built beneath the
existing one. They started in January 2011
and are due to finish in 2015. They are ex-
cavating the station tunnels and its associa-
ted internal passages, escalator shafts and
concourses using sprayed concrete lining,
ultimately to a 300-400mm thickness to
hold them place.