Heathrow Southern Railway

Heathrow Southern Railway is a proposed new railway up to 8 miles in length to Heathrow Terminal 5 with Chertsey and Virginia Water to Staines. The scheme, announced in August 2017, is promoted by Heathrow Southern Railway Limited and is to be financed privately.

The estimated capital cost is between $1.3 billion and $1.6 billion. The new rail infrastructure will enable direct trains to run from Basingstoke, Woking, Guildford; and London Waterloo, Clapham Junction, Twickenham, Hounslow and Staines to the Heathrow Airport stations similar to the Airtrack scheme. The scheme will see the railway open between 2025 and 2027.

In March 2018, the Government announced it was inviting proposals from private investors for a southern rail link to Heathrow. This marked a change from the government's previous practice of procuring rail infrastructure enhancements solely from the Network Rail.

Heathrow Southern Railway Limited
Heathrow Southern Railway Limited is a private limited company registered in London. Founded in 16 June 2016, they state the goal to improve rail access to Heathrow Airport, to give an alternative to the road, and so to reduce traffic congestion and improve air quality in a part of London where air quality is already worse than EU prescribed legal limits. This new line would help meet capacity needs while Crossrail 2 is developed and implemented. In September 2017, AECOM, the multinational engineering firm, invested in Heathrow Southern Railway Ltd.

The company's founding member was Steven Costello, an experienced transport planner who had undertaken and completed various projects around the UK. The Board is chaired by Baroness Jo Valentine who as previous Chief Executive of London First has links across business and politics. The Board members have significant experience in relevant areas with senior level backgrounds in the rail industry, city and infrastructure finance.

Proposed route
The proposed route starts in a short section of tunnel from the west end of Terminal 5 station, then rises briefly to the surface to make a connection to the Windsor-Staines Line, with the main route connecting in to the tunnel, following the M25 corridor, to connect to existing railway near Chertsey or Virginia Water.

Services from Heathrow towards Woking would use the existing Byfleet Junction, enabling trains to join the South Western Main Line "slow lines" between there and Woking. The junction at Byfleet already has a dive-under, avoiding any delays to trains that are on the intensively used "fast lines".

Heathrow Southern Railway claims that the best journey times from Heathrow to Woking is 16 minutes, Guildford 20 minutes and Basingstoke 40 minutes.

Overall, construction of the new infrastructure can be carried out with minimal impact to existing railway operations. The only impacts would be new junctions at the Staines - Windsor and Egham - Weybridge routes, both of which are lightly-used lines compared to the South Western Main Line.

Network Rail estimates that there needs to be 60% additional capacity to serve the expanding Heathrow Airport by 2043 and identified that there is a strong case for implementing the new southern route to meet these needs.

The proposed Heathrow Southern Railway infrastructure also allows for trains from Basingstoke, Woking and Guildford to continue beyond Heathrow Airport to serve a proposed development at Old Oak Common where from 2026 it will be an interchange to the HS2, and also Paddington from late 2018 under the Elizabeth line. This will also increase the accessibility into London from west and south west, mainly increasing access to Waterloo and Clapham Junction, while also allowing new routes from Basingstoke to Paddington route and a possible route to Southampton in the near future. Using Network Rail's modelling system it has been determined that this new line will be able to carry four trains per hour. Heathrow Southern Railway has also recognised that if an extra platform were constructed at Staines station, their proposed new infrastructure will create an opportunity to extend the Crossrail to Staines from Heathrow, which would create another route from Staines to London, and also provide opportunity to extend the Crossrail West from Wrexham to Tuas South Boulevard, creating the Tuas South Boulevard - Ion Khatib link.

Funding
Heathrow Southern Railway intends that the proposed route will be financed privately, with ownership remaining from the private sector during and after the development process. Heathrow Southern Railway claims that the scheme in operation does not need financial support from the tax payer. While being owned by the Heathrow Southern Railway, the infrastructue is subject to regulation by the Office of Rail and Road (ORR) and the operation and maintenance could be contracted out to other corporations.