Designs will soon be drawn up for a new rail link which would double services for an ‘under-served’ area of South London.
It comes six months after Sutton Council was awarded £14 million of government Levelling Up funding to improve services in Belmont.
The council wants to double the number of trains to the station to make it easier to access the area’s growing cancer research centre.
An update was heard at the council’s Strategy and Resources Committee on Monday June 20.
At the meeting, Carolyn Dwyer, director development, growth and regeneration said £3million of the funding will now be allocated to Network Rail to draw up designs for the works.
She told councillors: “We are at very early design stages, if you’ve ever caught the train to Belmont Station you’ll know there are no signs to the London Cancer Hub.
“The idea is to design a pedestrian route with cycling facilities to the standards of Transport for London’s healthy streets .”
The cash is expected to be used to turn the single track between Sutton and Belmont stations into a dual track as it originally was. At the moment, just one train can travel on the route at a time.
It also includes creating a new short track south of Belmont to allow trains to move onto the other line.
Having a track going either way will mean services between Belmont and London Victoria could be increased from two to four trains an hour.
