Heathrow Terminal 5 is a shared railway and

London Underground The London Underground (also known simply as the Underground or by its nickname the Tube) is a rapid transit system serving Greater London and some parts of the adjacent counties of Buckinghamshire, Essex and Hertfordshire in England. The ...

station serving Heathrow Terminal 5. It serves as a terminus for

Heathrow Express Heathrow Express is a high-frequency airport rail link operating between London Heathrow Airport and . Opened in 1998, trains run non-stop, with a journey time of 15 minutes. The service is operated jointly by Great Western Railway and Heathrow ...

services to

Paddington Paddington is an area within the City of Westminster, in Central London. First a medieval parish then a metropolitan borough, it was integrated with Westminster and Greater London in 1965. Three important landmarks of the district are Padd ...

, and for

Elizabeth line The Elizabeth line is a high-frequency hybrid urban–suburban rail service in London and its suburbs. It runs services on dedicated infrastructure in central London from the Great Western Main Line west of Paddington to and via Whitechapel ...

and London Underground Piccadilly line services to central London. It is managed and staffed by Heathrow Express. The London Underground section of the station is situated in

Travelcard Zone 6 Fare zone 6 is an outer zone of Transport for London's zonal fare system used for calculating the price of tickets for travel on the London Underground, London Overground, Docklands Light Railway, National Rail services (since 2007), and the El ...

; it is the westernmost below-ground station on the network. It is also the westernmost

National Rail National Rail (NR) is the trading name licensed for use by the Rail Delivery Group, an unincorporated association whose membership consists of the passenger train operating companies (TOCs) of England, Scotland, and Wales. The TOCs run the ...

station in London.

History

Following the longest public inquiry ever undertaken in the UK, construction of the station was granted in November 2001 by transport minister

Stephen Byers Stephen John Byers (born 13 April 1953) is a British Labour Party politician who was the Member of Parliament (MP) for Wallsend between 1992 and 1997, and North Tyneside from 1997 to 2010. He served in the Cabinet from 1998 to 2002, and was ...

as part of the approval of the Heathrow Terminal 5 project. Funded by British Airport Authority (BAA), construction of the extension as part of the T5 construction took 6 years. As part of the construction,

Heathrow Terminal 4 tube station Heathrow Terminal 4 is a London Underground station at Heathrow Airport on the Heathrow branch of the Piccadilly line. The station is situated in Travelcard Zone 6. History The station opened on 12 April 1986 to serve the then recently opened ...

was closed for 20 months between January 2005 and September 2006 to allow the connecting junctions to be constructed. Train testing started when the extension was handed over to London Underground on 18 July 2007. The station opened on 27 March 2008 coinciding with that of Heathrow Terminal 5. It was designed by architects HOK in conjunction with

Rogers Stirk Harbour + Partners Rogers may refer to: Places Canada *Rogers Pass (British Columbia) * Rogers Island (Nunavut) United States * Rogers, Arkansas, a city * Rogers, alternate name of Muroc, California, a former settlement * Rogers, Indiana, an unincorporated communit ...

. Although situated underground, parts of the station's roofing are made of

translucent In the field of optics, transparency (also called pellucidity or diaphaneity) is the physical property of allowing light to pass through the material without appreciable scattering of light. On a macroscopic scale (one in which the dimensions ...

ETFE Ethylene tetrafluoroethylene (ETFE) is a fluorine-based plastic. It was designed to have high corrosion resistance and strength over a wide temperature range. ETFE is a polymer and its source-based name is poly(ethene-co-tetrafluoroethene). It is ...

laminate panels, allowing natural daylight to flood down both ends of all six platforms. It is the only station at Heathrow Airport where both the

and Piccadilly line services share the same station.

Services

Terminal 5 station is served by the following rail services: * Piccadilly line from platforms 1 and 2: half the trains on the Heathrow branch terminate here, via

Hatton Cross Hatton including Hatton Cross is a small settlement and locality in the London boroughs of Hillingdon and Hounslow, on the south-eastern edge of London Heathrow Airport and straddling the A30 road. Priot to 1965 it was in the county of Middlese ...

and Heathrow Terminals 2 & 3. The other half do not serve Heathrow Terminal 5, running instead via the loop to service

Heathrow Terminal 4 Heathrow Terminal 4 is an airport terminal An airport terminal is a building at an airport where passengers transfer between ground transportation and the facilities that allow them to board and disembark from an aircraft. Within the ter ...

and Heathrow Terminals 2 & 3, before returning eastbound. *

terminus to and from

Paddington station Paddington, also known as London Paddington, is a Central London railway terminus and London Underground station complex, located on Praed Street in the Paddington area. The site has been the London terminus of services provided by the Great ...

from platforms 3 and 4. *

Elizabeth Line The Elizabeth line is a high-frequency hybrid urban–suburban rail service in London and its suburbs. It runs services on dedicated infrastructure in central London from the Great Western Main Line west of Paddington to and via Whitechapel ...

terminus to and from Abbey Wood station from platforms 3 and 4.

Free intra-terminal transfers

Until 2012, free transfer was not possible between terminals via the Underground, unlike on the Heathrow Express. In January 2012, free travel was introduced for

Oyster card The Oyster card is a payment method for public transport in London (and certain areas around it) in England, United Kingdom. A standard Oyster card is a blue credit-card-sized stored-value contactless smart card. It is promoted by Transport ...

and

contactless payment Contactless payment systems are credit cards and debit cards, key fobs, smart cards, or other devices, including smartphones and other mobile devices, that use radio-frequency identification (RFID) or near-field communication (NFC, e.g. Samsung ...

card holders between the Heathrow stations on the Piccadilly line. Journeys from Heathrow Terminal 5 to Terminal 4 via the Piccadilly line require a change at Hatton Cross; this journey is free, despite Hatton Cross not being part of the free travel zone.

Future links

From 2022, Heathrow Terminal 5 will be served by services running through the core section of the

, as part of the Crossrail project.The service opened on 24th May 2022, and currently runs along the Elizabeth line route, terminating at Paddington.

Network Rail Network Rail Limited is the owner (via its subsidiary Network Rail Infrastructure Limited, which was known as Railtrack plc before 2002) and infrastructure manager of most of the railway network in Great Britain. Network Rail is an "arm's leng ...

has put forward a proposal for a

Western Rail Approach to Heathrow The Western Rail Approach to Heathrow is a proposed bi-directional link westward from London's Heathrow Airport to the Great Western Main Line. It would thus run, in council areas, from Greater London under Iver, South Bucks, Buckinghamshir ...

, a short spur of track in tunnel which would run from a junction east of to Terminal 5 station. This would permit Great Western Main Line trains to run directly from and into Heathrow, without the need to change at Paddington. The proposal is currently at consultation stage and remains unconfirmed. In addition to the above rail links, Terminal 5 station also has two safeguarded "heavy rail" platforms for use by a west-facing connection to the

network. The south-leaning proposal would spur off the

Waterloo to Reading Line Waterloo most commonly refers to: * Battle of Waterloo, a battle on 18 June 1815 in which Napoleon met his final defeat * Waterloo, Belgium, where the battle took place. Waterloo may also refer to: Other places Antarctica *King George Island (S ...

west of Staines railway station (originally dubbed

Heathrow Airtrack Heathrow Airtrack was a proposed railway link in the United Kingdom which would link Heathrow Airport in west London to London Waterloo railway station in Central London. The line, as proposed by BAA, would run from across the suburbs of ...

, with a newer proposal named

Heathrow Southern Railway Heathrow Southern Railway is a proposed new railway in the United Kingdom which would link Heathrow Airport to railway lines south of London. The scheme, announced in August 2017, is promoted by Heathrow Southern Railway Limited and would be fin ...

). It proposes direct rail services to

London Waterloo Waterloo station (), also known as London Waterloo, is a central London terminus on the National Rail network in the United Kingdom, in the Waterloo area of the London Borough of Lambeth. It is connected to a London Underground station of ...

Reading Reading is the process of taking in the sense or meaning of letters, symbols, etc., especially by sight or touch. For educators and researchers, reading is a multifaceted process involving such areas as word recognition, orthography (spelling ...

, Woking, Guildford and

Gatwick Airport Gatwick Airport (), also known as London Gatwick , is a major international airport near Crawley, West Sussex, England, south of Central London. In 2021, Gatwick was the third-busiest airport by total passenger traffic in the UK, after H ...

. Due to the cost of replacing three level crossings, one in a very urban part of

Egham Egham ( ) is a university town in the Borough of Runnymede in Surrey, England, approximately west of central London. First settled in the Bronze Age, the town was under the control of Chertsey Abbey for much of the Middle Ages. In 1215, Magna ...

, the proposals are currently unfunded.

Connections

London Buses routes

350 __NOTOC__ Year 350 ( CCCL) was a common year starting on Monday (link will display the full calendar) of the Julian calendar. At the time, it was known as the Year of the Consulship of Sergius and Nigrinianus (or, less frequently, year 1103 '' ...

423 __NOTOC__ Year 423 ( CDXXIII) was a common year starting on Monday (link will display the full calendar) of the Julian calendar. At the time, it was known as the Year of the Consulship of Marinianus and Asclepiodotus (or, less frequently, year ...

, 482, 490 and night route N9 serve the station.Heathrow Airport Terminal 5
Transport for London

First Berkshire & The Thames Valley First Beeline Buses, trading as First Berkshire & The Thames Valley, is a bus operator providing services in and around Slough. It is a subsidiary of FirstGroup. History In January 1986 Alder Valley North Limited, later renamed, The Berks ...

National Express National Express Group is a British multinational public transport company headquartered in Birmingham, England. It operates bus, coach, train and tram services in the United Kingdom, Ireland (National Express operates Eurolines in conjunction ...

and

Oxford Bus Company Oxford Bus Company is the trading name of The City of Oxford Motor Services Ltd. Company Number 91106 It is a bus operator serving the city and surrounding area of Oxford, England. It is a subsidiary of the Go-Ahead Group. History Horse trams ...

also operate connecting bus and coach services.

References

External links

*
Proposed AirTrack Rail Link
{{authority control Piccadilly line stations London Underground Night Tube stations Tube stations in the London Borough of Hillingdon Railway stations in the London Borough of Hillingdon Railway stations opened by Network Rail Railway stations in Great Britain opened in 2008 Railway stations served by Heathrow Express Airport railway stations in the United Kingdom London Underground stations located underground 5 tube station Railway stations located underground in the United Kingdom 2008 establishments in England Railway stations served by the Elizabeth line