Silvertown Tunnel: New tunnel in London explained, map of route, when will it open - will there be a charge for it and Blackwall Tunnel?

Next year motorists will have to pay tolls to use two tunnels under the Thames, Transport for London (TfL) has announced. The £2bn Silvertown Tunnel is set to open in “summer 2025” at which time tolls, charged at the same rate, will also be introduced on the nearby Blackwall Tunnel.

The Silvertown Tunnel is a controversial 1.4km long infrastructure project stretching from Silvertown in Newham to the Greenwich Peninsula. TfL’s contractors are now completing the “cut and cover” sections to link the Tunnels to the existing road network. While this is being done, the southbound exit and northbound approach to the Blackwall Tunnel have been reduced from three lanes to two worsening the delays.

Construction is costing about £1bn – with a further £1.2bn due in annual repayments over the next 25 years. David Rowe, TfL’s director of investment planning, said the Silvertown Tunnel would lead to a “much improved situation in terms of better air quality”.

Each tunnel will have two lanes – one for buses and the other for cars and lorries. Cyclists will be banned from riding through the tunnel, instead they will be able to load their bike onto a cyclists-only bus.

TfL is due to announce this autumn the amount that drivers will be charged to use the tunnels. A levy of about £4 per crossing is expected for cars. At present, the Blackwall Tunnels – which link the A2 and A12 - are used by about 100,000 vehicles a day, and drivers do not have to pay a toll. Mr Rowe said a key target is to reduce overall pollution and they will do that through tolls.

Mr Rowe said: “Having Silvertown will ensure people have a reliable way to cross the river. The user charge ensures we don’t attract any more vehicles to this part of London but that we do enable more trips by public transport.

“This scheme is fundamentally three things: it’s the new crossing, it’s the user charge and it’s the new cross-river bus services. You are not attracting more traffic but you are solving the problems you have got with congestion. These are the critical three elements that all need to work together to ensure the success of the scheme.”

When asked if building the Silvertown Tunnel was still the “right thing to do”, London Mayor Sadiq Khan told the Standard: “Absolutely.” He said: “I have seen the congestion. I have seen the consequences when the Blackwall Tunnel is closed on a regular basis, of the east of our city not having the investment the west does.”

Dominic Leggett, of the Anti-Silvertown campaign group, is against the project arguing that there will be a “substantial increase in traffic” and “local pollution”. He said: “Whether or not Blackwall is tolled - which is a decision that's entirely up to future mayors - TfL's own figures show that opening Silvertown to general traffic now will always lock in a substantial increase in traffic, local pollution, and carbon emissions for decades to come, and undermine all the mayor's pollution and climate targets. Given he knows these fact, he needs to have the courage to act urgently to review the scheme, and prevent the significant harm it will otherwise do to some of London's most vulnerable residents.”

Silvertown Tunnel map

The Silvertown Tunnel will be a pair of road tunnels beneath the Thames connecting North Greenwich to the western end of Silvertown in the Royal Docks. The tunnels will connect to the A1020 Silvertown Way/Lower Lea Crossing to the north, and feed into the Blackwall Tunnel Southern Approach road to the south.

The Silvertown Tunnel is intended for motor vehicles only, with no cycles, pedestrians, or e-scooters. The nearby Blackwall Tunnels are frequently congested or blocked, leading to tailbacks. The Silvertown Tunnel is expected to provide extra capacity, and add redundancy that will help if the existing tunnels are blocked.