---

Crossrail Bill

There may be other plans and Crossrail may have considered them, but it has not pursued that option. What I am asking today is for the Minister to revive that option and look further into the details. A decision has been taken, but not a fair decision, so other alternatives need to be considered. Will the Minister assure my constituents that he will investigate why this option has been decided and ensure that the North Pole alternative is given serious and urgent consideration? Other effects of the work in Romford include the extension of an underpass widely used by residents ranging from children to the elderly. It will be extended from 43 to 75 m. Associated works at Romford station will cause considerable disruption with yet more work sites and more construction vehicles. The affected residents are effectively stuck in the area, because once Crossrail reaches planning stages and starts showing up a negative on searches, residents will be unable to sell their homes, causing blight to many home owners in my constituency. I feel that that is totally unfair to my constituents. I turn now to the effects of Crossrail in the Gidea park area of my constituency, where railway sidings and an access route are being proposed. The residents of Cambridge avenue, Amery gardens and the surrounding area will have imposed on them a large area for the storage of Crossrail trains—yet more disturbance, noise and pollution. Gidea park is another quiet residential area and although the Liverpool Street line runs through the community, using the land at the rear of residential properties for that particular purpose is an entirely new development, to which most local people are completely opposed. There is also the access route for vehicles proposed via the Southend arterial road, where lorries will thunder past residential properties and around the sides of people’s homes, causing no end of disturbance. As the local MP, I speak on behalf of all local residents from the area who feel that this plan is totally and utterly unacceptable. It has also become increasingly apparent that affected residents in the area will have little to gain from the development or from the Crossrail service itself. As such, I believe that connecting the Great Eastern Shenfield line into the Crossrail scheme could prove a serious mistake—a view shared by my hon. Friend the Member for Brentwood and Ongar. From what I can see, the £1.5 billion that it will cost far outweighs the potential benefits to passengers from Romford. There will be only a slight increase in capacity and, by the time that the whole scheme is commissioned, it will have been absorbed by the growth of towns along the eastern route. There is no real evidence that journey times for passengers on this branch will decrease substantially. Most commuters from Romford walk from Liverpool Street station to jobs in the City and there is also a good interchange at Stratford on to the Central line. Since the Crossrail scheme was revived by the central London rail study, the Jubilee line has been constructed, allowing passengers to travel directly to Canary Wharf and the west end, reducing the congestion on the Central line.