Crossrail’s TBM Phyllis Reaches Bond Street Station

Tunneling machine Phyllis has reached the south of the new Bond Street western ticket hall at Davies Street having completed 2 miles of new tunnels. Phyllis is one of eight TBMs constructing a marathon-equivalent 26 miles of tunnels between Royal Oak in west London and Woolwich in southeast London.

The new Crossrail Bond Street Station features two new ticket halls at Davies Street and Hanover Square. Around 220,000 passengers a day will pass through the new station, helping boost visitor numbers to the thriving cultural and retail destinations in Oxford Street and the West End. The Bond Street ticket halls will also each feature over-station property developments, helping create new business space, retail opportunities and jobs for Londoners on top of the world-class new transport links being delivered.

Crossrail has excavated two of five levels for the new western ticket hall and will reach tunnel level later this year. Over the next two weeks, Phyllis will travel 250 m to the eastern ticket hall at Hanover Square and pass the halfway mark in her journey. There, she will meet a specially made underground chamber where workers will be able to reach the face of the cutterhead for the first time since she began her tunnel journey, allowing maintenance work to take place.

Bringing up the rear is TBM Ada who will reach the new Bond Street Station later in the spring. Both machines will reach Farringdon at the end of the year where they will finish their journey. Collectively Phyllis and Ada have constructed over 3.7 miles of new rail tunnels. Together with three other TBMs in the east nearly 7 km of the 42 km of new tunnels have been constructed so far on the Crossrail route.