£300m transport boost for London

Date: 3/12/2012

A £300 million transport fund has been announced by Mayor of London Boris Johnson in order to give the capital an economic boost.

Eight projects will share the fund, all in deprived areas, ranging from Barking to Battersea and Croydon to Tottenham.

These zones have all been held back in the past by a lack of good transport links, but this is set to be redressed with the cash injection, which is expected to create 50,000 new jobs and 50,000 new homes.

£170 million worth of funding from (TfL) Transport for London will be spent on engineering works to improve bottlenecks on roads while a further £130 million will be used to upgrade rail and Tube stations.

Richard Blakeway, Deputy Mayor for Housing, said: "The priority is to identify where infrastructure can unlock development.

"It’s a continuing story of how we draw together the Mayor’s powers from transport, planning and housing to make a real change and accelerate delivery."

It has been predicted that Chancellor George Osborne will announce more funding for improved infrastructure across the UK in the Autumn Statement as a way to kickstart the economy.

Under the plans a new Crossrail station is to be built at Woolwich with Elephant & Castle and Tottenham Hale both having station upgrades fast tracked in the wake of last year's riots.

Barking Riverside will be given a road upgrade and work will be carried out to ease the congestion which is caused during rush hour in Croydon.

The area surrounding Vauxhall station will be pedestrianised, as will Waterloo, with cycle paths to be implemented around the Shell Centre and Elizabeth House.

Money for the fund will be generated from an expected £6 billion in efficiency savings at TfL to come about by 2018, as well as revenue from property, advertising and retail.

Mr Johnson said: "This new pot of funding is being specifically targeted on improving transport links across the areas of our city where there is huge potential for economic development.

"By improving the transport infrastructure we can accelerate development and provide the catalyst that will lead to thousands more homes and jobs."

Posted by Mary Treen

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