I went to Essex County Council recently and met with the lead councillor and officers for major projects at Essex County Council to discuss progress on the new Army and Navy junction and Beaulieu station. Both these projects are extremely complex and are taking time to deliver, but they are on track. Recently work has been taking place over night at the Army and Navy to access the drainage systems and this has gone well. The engineers and designers are putting together the outline business case for the junction which is expected to be completed in September. This is required before a full planning approval process can commence.
The plans for the station are also going through the various phases of planning. Building the station also involves moving the entire Great Eastern Mainline track by a few meters on each direction of line, as well as splicing in new track and amending signalling. This all has to be completed in phases whilst keeping the trains running. Therefore many of the elements will only be able to take place when the train line is shut down over certain bank holidays. It is a very significant engineering challenge and will take about 3 years before it is completed - but I am pressing for it to happen as quickly as possible.
