Crossrail Station, Canary Wharf

Canary Wharf will be one of the largest Crossrail stations. Like the nearby Canary Wharf Tube station, the new Crossrail station has been built in the dock water area, in this case the North Dock of West India Quay.

The station, retail and park areas are six storeys high; approximately the size of One Canada Square laid on its side. This makes it one of Europe’s largest railway and infrastructure construction projects and WJ was trusted to carry out dewatering works for the ambitious station construction.

The station development will provide a link between Canary Wharf and Poplar, currently severed by the North Dock. It also includes links with the Canary Wharf Estate, via Adam’s Place and the Jubilee line and DLR stations. When works are completed the remainder of the site will be handed back to Canary Wharf Group to enable development of office space at North Quay, which already has planning permission.

The station design incorporates two parts – a huge 256 metre long station box sitting directly below the over site development. To allow construction of the box, the water level in the Lower Aquifer, consisting of the Thanet Sand and Chalk, needed to be reduced to approximately 40 m below ground level. This was achieved by the installation of 11 chalk wells drilled to a depth of 90m. In addition, we were able to enlist a number of existing wells associated with other developments on the Canary Wharf estate to assist the drawdown.

A number of piezometers were then installed to monitor the water levels within the vicinity of the site and over a larger area. As the distance of influence of the pumping scheme was large, following completion of the station box the wells remained operational to assist with the construction of other aspects of the project such as nearby cross passages. This gave huge logistical and financial benefits to the project; WJ ensuring maximum bang for the project’s buck!

One of Europe’s largest railway and infrastructure construction projects and WJ was trusted enough to secure work on the Crossrail Passages: the tunnels needed between the Crossrail TBM drive tunnels to house control equipment, sumps and for emergency evacuation.

• LOCATION: Canary Wharf, London
• CLIENT: Canary Wharf Group
• MAIN CONTRACTOR: Canary Wharf Contractors Limited

For more information please visit the official Crossrail Canary Wharf website.