A look at Hither Green station upgrade work

Work is ongoing to upgrade Hither Green station with new entrances, a new footbridge spanning all platforms and lift access.

Work has been ongoing throughout this year and upon completion the footbridge will span all six platforms with four 16-person lifts and staircases to each.

It took some time to commence with approval first given in 2019 and a further six year wait to commence.

It’s believed a new bridge will be lifted into place during February 2026. The below image shows bases for the bridge alongside an externally complete lift shaft.

That new bridge will connect to two new accessible station entrances either side of the railway on Fernbrook Road and Springbank Road.

Once installed Network Rail state “the four lifts will have live feeds on their operating status to help customers with their step free journey planning and to ensure good reliability.”

As luck would have it while there the Networkers painted back into Network Southeast colours arrived.

It’s the nicer type of Networker with a less gloomy internal colour scheme and a small first class section.

Hither Green station growth

The station saw 2.9 million journeys in the latest annual figures up to March 2025 which was an eight per cent increase on the year before.

It’s a key interchange point between the Sidcup and Grove Park lines and the hope from Southeastern is step-free access with reduce changes made at Lewisham.

Like other recently rebuilt Southeastern Metro stations there’s no word on additional staffing or ticket gate installation upon completion of work unlike other new stations on other networks serving less than three million passengers a year.

Staffing

A lack of willingness from Southeastern’s owners – i.e. the government – to fund extra staffing is still evident and four years after the Department for Transport took over they still don’t seem keen to properly staff the network to a level seen elsewhere.

Note for example recently opened Greater Anglia stations at Cambridge North and Beaulieu Park. It’s also night and day with much of TfL’s operations.

Will Southeastern Metro change with Great British Railways? Southeastern have led the way with merging Network Rail and train operations which it’s claimed saves money though there’s little evidence it’s being reinvested into staffing.

Most Metro stations across the network are open, see limited staffing presence and with no staff on Metro trains aside from a driver it’s not very effective at revenue protection nor enticing passengers worried about safety particularly at night.

For another example of stations being rebuilt without adequate staffing see the recently rebuilt Kidbrooke station – where annual growth was 14.8 per cent – and Deptford which is up 16.3 per cent on an annual basis.

Kidbrooke saw a small new station building built in recent years (which is often shut) beside Kidbrooke Village’s 5,400 homes while the northern entrance is simply a small gate in a fence despite 1,000 extra new homes on that side of the station.

Work at Hither Green is expected to complete in late 2027 eight years after funding was first announced. Getting many things done in the UK is not fast.

Changes will be very welcome though not having a greater staff presence post-completion would continue the Southeastern Metro legacy of improvements which are undertaken not fully capitalising and improving the Metro network’s great potential.