The other eastern branch runs underground from Whitechapel to Canary Wharf and Abbey Wood.
It takes over the Custom House to Woolwich via Connaught tunnel stretch of the former North London Line built by the Eastern Counties and Thames Junction Railway, and connects it with the North Kent Line via a tunnel under the Thames at North Woolwich.
The cost of the east–west scheme including rolling stock was estimated at £885 million.
Both the Labour and Conservative parties made commitments in their manifestos for the 2010 election to deliver the railway, and the coalition government formed after the election also committed to the project.
It was also suggested that the alignment of the tunnels should be safeguarded while a final decision was taken.
The Central London Rail Study of 1989 proposed tunnels linking the existing rail network as the "East–West Crossrail", "City Crossrail", and "North–South Crossrail" schemes.
There will be new stations at Paddington, Bond Street, Tottenham Court Road, Farringdon, Liverpool Street and Whitechapel, with interchanges with the London Underground and other National Rail services.The need for extra capacity along this corridor is such that the former head of Tf L, Sir Peter Hendy, predicted that the Crossrail lines will be "immediately full" as soon as they open.The concept of large-diameter tunnels crossing central London to connect Paddington in the west and Liverpool Street in the east was first proposed by railwayman George Dow in The Star newspaper in June 1941.A "dive-under" was constructed at Acton to allow passenger trains to pass slower freight trains leaving and entering a goods yard.It was completed in July 2016 and was brought into use in 2017.