Bexleyheath rail line sees passenger growth with Kidbrooke topping league

In keeping with a series of posts looking at rail recovery at stations on Southeastern it’s time now to move attention to growth along the Bexleyheath line.

All stations saw growth with Kidbrooke topping the league according to data from the Office for Road and Rail.

Overall the Bexleyheath line only saw one station top ten per cent increases which was below the Greenwich line (five stations) above 10 per cent and north Kent with eight from Dartford to Rainham. The Sidcup and Hayes’ lines will follow in future post.

I’ve included other stations shared with services along different lines including Dartford and Blackheath to St Johns for the sake of completeness.

Bexleyheath saw the smallest annual growth at 0.75 per cent with Kidbrooke seeing 14.8 per cent growth.

Major growth

Kidbrooke is of course one of south east London’s major hotspots for new housing. The old Ferrier estate comprised less than 2,000 homes and has been demolished for Kidbrooke Village which is looking to finish at around 5,500 homes.

In addition TfL have built homes directly beside the Kent-bound platform. Around two-thirds of an eventual 619-homes are finished.

There’s also nearly 500 homes being built by Greenwich Council a short distance away, with another 100 further yet on Rochester Way.

All in Kidbrooke is seeing more than 6,500 new dwellings. Many are yet to be built so strong rises can be expected for years to come. Some have started to become occupied over the months since station usage figures (April 2024 to March 2025).

New housing at many other stations isn’t too great with most on the smaller side, such as Greenwich’s plan near Falconwood station.

Eltham saw 8.38 per cent growth and new homes are being built off the High Street. One such project sees 40 homes.

Again this is from Greenwich Council’s council housebuilding programme. An Eltham bingo site has also seen redevelopment plans come in but again not on a large scale. Potential plans for a possible 130 dwellings in 2019 are now down to 28.

Bexleyheath sees small growth and the station’s location someway from the town centre mitigate growth there having much impact. One potential new site has just been submitted for planning approval though and covered last week.

It sees Bexley Council’s BexleyCo developer propose 70 homes.

Kidbrooke

All those smaller schemes though fall far short of Kidbrooke where the major growth is and will be in future. Various plots have still to start including hundreds of homes at Phase 5.

Phase 6 to the north west of the site has yet to even start.

Some blocks on phase 5 now underway were looking all but complete on a recent visit.

All trains on the line do pass through Lewisham further towards central London on the way to Victoria, Charing Cross or Cannon Street station.

Lewisham

Lewisham is of course another major growth area with rising passengers there meeting an increase at places like Kidbrooke.

Major sites in line for high density redevelopment include Lewisham shopping centre, Lewisham retail park on Loampit Vale and Lewisham Tesco.

With all that in mind passenger number recovery should continue for some years to come along the line with certain hotspots seeing a sharper increase.

In coming days I’ll take a look at how other lines are shaping up including both the Sidcup line and Hayes line.

Services

Cuts along the Bexleyheath line were made in 2022 under the last government with some restorations since made. The former two trains per hour service to Charing Cross was removed in its entirety off-peak and on weekends before one service an hour was reinstated.

Next week’s timetable change sees a couple more evening services restored from Charing Cross to Dartford but for much of the day it remains at one train per hour.

That leaves some sizable gaps in service intervals. Aside from restoring cuts there could be scope to improve services particularly on weekends. Gaps of 24 minutes exist on Saturday and Sundays which isn’t great for stations in the midst of thousands of homes.

In contrast TfL are improving Saturday services next week on the Elizabeth line to capture increasing demand.

Southeastern changes however are dependent on central government funding improvements and support, and despite much talk of new homes around stations (see the Housing Secretary’s comments again recently) when it comes to putting the funds in, the Department for Transport and Treasury too often say no for more rail services despite clear and rising demand.