Frustration Over Continued Chiswick Park Footbridge Delay

Overcrowding continues at Gunnersbury station as project fails to make progress

The West Chiswick & Gunnersbury Society ( WCGS) has said overcrowding at Gunnersbury tube station at peak periods is now very worrying and has appealed for urgent action to get the Chiswick Park footbridge built to relieve the burden on the station.

Work on the bridge has not yet started because a legal agreement has not yet been signed between the Council and the rail companies, despite it being now a year since Hounslow Council's Planning Committee approved the application for the much-delayed bridge.

The footbridge will extend from Chiswick Business Park to Chiswick Park Station, allowing business park employees quick access to a second tube station and thus taking the pressure off Gunnersbury.

Marie Rabouhans, chair of the WCGS criticised the "serious delay" in providing the footbridge. She paid a visit to Gunnersbury Station last week during rush-hour where she witnessed at first hand the peak-hour overcrowding and anger and frustration of commuters who were held in queues because of safety issues.

During the morning peak period, TfL staff managing the situation had to hold passengers in a queue and deny them access to the platform to board trains until the way was cleared of exiting passengers, she said. Some people complained they were missing their train because of the delay. TfL staff were bearing the brunt of people's anger and frustration.

Outside the station, crowds either joining bus queues, or crossing the road are at risk and there has been a delay in the promised 'countdown indicator' at the pedestrian crossing promised by TfL, said Mrs. Rabouhans

Full text of the West Chiswick & Gunnersbury Society statement on this matter.

Local residents and commuters at Gunnersbury tube have become increasingly disgruntled at platform overcrowding and have posted several messages on the chiswickw4.com forum.

A planning application submitted last year for the scheme was approved at a Planning Committee meeting of Hounslow Council twelve months ago. This was actually the second application approved as the first had expired.

A typical scene of overcrowding at Gunnersbury

Last October Cllr Peter Thompson, who chairs the Gunnersbury Station Action Team- a partnership of local residents, business owners, TFL, Network Rail and Hounslow Council, which was set up by Mary Macleod, said that funding for the bridge (£4m) was now with the Council and "we are hoping that the final legal agreements will be signed any day now.  It should be in place and open by the end of 2017."

It is not known whether this deadline is likely to be met.

The images are from earlier documentation associated with the project.

December 15, 2016