No London Overground service all weekend (Southern Railways operating)

From TFL’s “Weekend travel information” email:

This leaves us with only 2 trains an hour on Saturday but 4 an hour on Sunday!

Saturday
Forest Hill to London Bridge at 43 and 13 past each hour from 0643 to 2313

London Bridge to Forest Hill at 10 and 40 past each hour from 0610 to 2340 then 0020 & 0035

Sunday
Forest Hill to London Bridge at 0735, 0749, 0805 then at 18, 31, 48 and 01 past each hour until 1231 then at 46, 01, 16, 31 past each hour from 1246 until 2346

London Bridge to Forest Hill at 0731, 0738, 0801 then at 08, 24, 38 and 54 past each hour from 0808 to 2308 then 2331, 2336 and 2350

Southbound services from Forest Hill on Saturday terminate at Coulsdon Town but on Sunday 2 services terminate at Caterham/Tattenham and 2 at Tulse Hill.

According to the ‘planned line closure’ information on the TFL website this is the first of 7 weekends in a row without London Overground services! However the ‘engineering works’ information for London Overground on the National Rail Enquiries website does not match what is shown on TFL for every weekend

Is this works the normal? Basically closing forest Hill Station to allow other places to get more trains

Is this something to do with Crossrail I wonder. The fact that Southern Services are running from London Bridge (well the very limited number of them) would seem to imply that?

@John_Wilson
Forest Hill station isn’t being closed - there are still Southern services to London Bridge and Coulsdon Town (Saturday) and Caterham/Tattenham/Tulse (Sunday) running. It’s the London Overground services on the whole line from Highbury & Islington to Clapham Junction/New Cross Gate/Crystal Palace/West Croydon that aren’t running. No doubt the London Overground stations that won’t have any services will be closed. National Rail Enquiries show a little more detail than TFL:

@squashst
I’ve seen TFL state on some of the previous closures that it’s been due to Crossrail work being undertaken at Whitechapel but there’s no mention of Crossrail on any of these! But I have read elsewhere that with Network Rail’s maintenance crews having to adhere to social distancing it is resulting in work taking longer.

@ChrisR sorry, not closed just massively reduced service with no reason given for it - it’s pretty typical often without any notice at the station. often it is so that new Cross gate can be upgraded for services that won’t come to FH

Depending on where the works are Overground trains could run to Canada Water. I was once on a train that pulled in at Canada Water on the southbound platform.
I think we should campaign for this service to be maintained, if the closure is further north.

I believe the reason why the ELL core is closed this weekend is for signalling work, which will allow extra trains to run through it. This is essential to getting more services on our part of the line.

There have been long term plans to run an extra 2tph to Crystal Palace and 2tph to Clapham Junction. (They can’t currently operate extra trains to West Croydon until the major re-signalling works between East Croydon, Norwood Junction and Selhurst are completed)

Incorrect. It’s just standard engineering works that’s been put off, such as replacing long sections of rail etc. (It’s not as easy replacing the rails in Thames Tunnel as it is through Forest Hill station). There was supposed to be a week of closure over Easter to do these, but due to Covid, these were postponed. Putting in to smaller time frames has meant it has had to be done on weekends with smaller time frames and give extra time in case of overrun.

The planned increase to 18tph has been postponed to at least December 2022. Reintroduction of Night Overground has been postponed to March 2021 at least, with no set date of starting again, same as Night Tube.

@Flora_Noris correct me if I’m wrong the 18tph was more of an incentive to stop complaining rather than an actual promise - and of course the extra Clapham Junction trains don’t go near us.
The Thames Tunnel is north of Canada Water so they can operate a Canada Water (or New Cross Gate) - W Croydon service

BTW I’m all for lot of engineering works at the moment - we shouldn’t really be travelling much, but wish they would keep us informed (particularly at the station)

this is rubbish-I have to get to work on Saturday and this means I’ll have to get to station extra early to get a train which will probably be busy not ideal in the days of Covid

No it was planned to happen by December this year. As rbmartin mentioned earlier, there will be resignalling done between Surrey Quays and Rotherhithe to enable more trains. (There is one signal between Canada Water and Rotherhithe, so a train can’t leave Canada Water Northbound until the train ahead is nearly at Wapping, and in the reverse, a train can’t leave Rotherhithe Southbound until the train ahead is just leaving the tunnel entrance. The new signalling will allow a train in the platform at Rotherhithe, one in the platform at Canada Water and one train between.)

The increase to 18tph would’ve been 1 extra to Crystal Palace, 1 extra to Clapham Junction.

The Thames Tunnel is north of Canada Water so they can operate a Canada Water (or New Cross Gate) - W Croydon service

They could in theory, very easily due to the crossovers south of the station, however I’m not sure if those shunt moves have been permitted to be used in normal passenger service. They have only ever been used whilst out of service. (Possibly due to short platforms, not sure). Also, depending on the area of engineering works, the limits of electrical isolation of the third rail will also come in to play. I agree 100% though, a service up to Canada Water at the minimum would be incredibly beneficial to everyone in our area.

When they terminate at Shadwell it’s much easier, trains empty out on the Northbound, turnaround in the tunnel, come back to start journey on Southbound. If it were to happen at Canada Water, you’d have passengers coming up from Jubilee Line on both sides, not knowing which platform will be serving which destination, as it could vary from side to side depending on timings.

Nothings ever as simple and easy for us passengers though!

I have been a passenger on an Overground train that pulled into the southbound platform at Canada Water.

There’s a first for everything . Was that during engineering works or due to disruption?

There was no explanation given. It was a complete shock when the train pulled in on the wrong platform. However, it was very easy to get access to the Jubilee line as there is a lot more space on the southbound platform.