Two new junctions which will connect the Northern line with an extension of the route out to Battersea Power Station have been completed.

The very first train was photographed travelling over one of the new step plate junctions on New Year’s Day.

When the extension opens in 2020, trains from Battersea will join the Charing Cross branch of the Northern line via new junctions on the Kennington Loop.

The Kennington Loop’s old cast iron tunnel segments have had to be removed and the track and concrete trackbed lifted to make way for two new turnouts for the north-bound and south-bound lines.

Ferrovial Agroman and Laing O’Rourke are delivering the Northern line extension between Kennington station and Battersea, which will include a second new station at Nine Elms.

A twin-bore tunnel, which runs beneath the Victoria line at Vauxhall, has been excavated and attention is now turning to installing the track and systems.

Reflecting on the work completed on the Tube network over Christmas, Mark Wild, TfL’s managing director of London Underground, said: “This work is part of our record investment in the Tube, which will see over 40 per cent of the network radically improved with more frequent trains, quicker journeys and better reliability and the first major extension to the Tube network since the 1990s.”

Green light for station entrance

At the end of December, Wandsworth Council also approved designs for the Northern line extension’s eastern station entrance at Battersea.

The new station is due to open in 2020 and will include two entrances: an eastern entrance on the edge of Prospect Park and a western entrance towards the southern end of the new High Street.

The council said it will be the first Tube station to be built in the borough for 95 years.

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