Southern England
Sub-national area of England
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We include updates on London, Bristol, Greater London, Cambridge, English Channel, Plymouth, Norwich, East West Rail, London Stansted Airport, Colchester, Peterborough, St Albans, Southend-on-Sea, High Speed 1, Luton Airport, Home counties ... and more.
| April 2025 |
High Speed 1
Gemini Trains announced plans to operate trains across the Eurotunnel and applied for access to the Temple Mills Depot.
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| 2025 |
High Speed 1
Evolyn plans to order 12 trains from Alstom, contingent on securing project financing and regulatory approval.
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| 2025 |
High Speed 1
Evolyn initially planned to start non-stop services between London and Paris
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| 2025 |
London Stansted Airport
Construction of the terminal extension is scheduled to begin, with the project expected to last two to three years.
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| February 2025 |
High Speed 1
HS1 Ltd. begins trading under the new name London St. Pancras Highspeed, aiming to take a more consumer-facing approach and explore options for expanding capacity at London St. Pancras International railway station.
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| November 2024 |
High Speed 1
Virgin Group and Evolyn highlight Eurostar's non-agreement for Temple Mills depot access during an industry event at the Houses of Parliament, subsequently appealing to the ORR to assess available capacity.
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| January 2024 |
High Speed 1
Deutsche Bahn reaffirmed its fundamental interest in transport between London and the mainland through the Eurotunnel, while noting that routes and trains were not yet equipped with end-to-end ETCS.
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| 2023 |
London
Greater London's population reached just under 10 million, making it Europe's third-most populous city.
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| 2023 |
London Stansted Airport
Near pre-pandemic passenger levels with 27,951,291 passengers, a 20% increase from 2022, 179,135 aircraft movements, and 251,864 tonnes of freight.
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| 2023 |
London Stansted Airport
Annual passenger numbers reached 28 million, marking a significant recovery and growth since the previous peak in 2007.
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| 2023 |
London Stansted Airport
Stansted Airport canceled the arrivals terminal project after a review, deciding instead to focus on expanding the existing 1991 terminal building.
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| 2023 |
London
Department for Transport stopped funding Low Traffic Neighbourhoods (LTN) in London, despite evidence showing benefits outweighing costs by approximately 100 times.
|
| 2023 |
London
London had 155,700 hotel rooms, with projections to grow to 183,600 rooms, making it the city with the most hotel rooms outside of China.
|
| December 2023 |
High Speed 1
Getlink announced plans to double the market for direct high-speed trains from the UK within 10 years, with potential services to Cologne, Frankfurt, Geneva, and Zurich. The company aims to reduce time to market from 10 to 5 years through market research, tunnel regulation standardization, and collaboration with network operators.
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| November 2023 |
High Speed 1
Dutch rail start-up Heuro, led by Maarten van den Biggelaar, announced plans to operate 16 daily services from Amsterdam to London and Paris, seeking €600 million in funding and planning to use Zefiro V300 trains.
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| November 1 2023 |
London Stansted Airport
The government's Planning Inspectorate approved the London Stansted Airport terminal expansion plan.
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| July 2023 |
London Stansted Airport
MAG announced a new proposal for a terminal reconfiguration and three-bay extension, aiming to increase terminal size by a third and expand passenger capacity from 35 million to 43 million annual passengers.
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| 2022 | Southern Football League Cup discontinued |
| 2022 |
London Stansted Airport
London Stansted Airport recorded significant passenger growth across multiple routes, with Antalya experiencing the most dramatic increase at 967.5% compared to 2021, and other destinations like Istanbul–Sabiha Gökçen (255.4%), Budapest (258.0%), and Rome–Ciampino (290.6%) also showing substantial passenger recovery.
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| 2022 |
London Stansted Airport
Substantial recovery with passenger numbers jumping 225.9% to 23,289,652, 159,502 aircraft movements, and freight volume slightly decreasing to 243,153 tonnes.
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| 2022 |
London Stansted Airport
By late 2022, Stansted Airport showed signs of recovery, with passenger levels nearing 97% of pre-pandemic volumes.
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| 2022 |
London
Homicide figures decreased to 109 murders for the year, showing a decline in violent crime.
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| December 2022 | The Cambridge TV studio closed, and broadcasts returned to a region-wide format from Norwich. |
| July 19 2022 |
London
Recorded the highest temperature at Heathrow.
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| May 2022 |
London
The Elizabeth Line (Crossrail) was opened, introducing a new east-west railway line through London and into the Home Counties, with a branch to Heathrow Airport. This was Europe's largest construction project, with a projected cost of £15 billion.
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| May 26 2022 | Announcement made that the separate West edition of the programme would end due to BBC cost-cutting measures. |
| 2021 |
London Stansted Airport
Continued pandemic recovery with slight passenger decline to 7,145,802, a 5.2% reduction, and 93,316 aircraft movements, with freight increasing to 263,631 tonnes.
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| 2021 |
London Stansted Airport
The Planning Inspectorate overturned the council's planning permission refusal following a public inquiry, approving the arrivals terminal project.
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| 2021 |
London Stansted Airport
During the COVID-19 pandemic, ranked as the second busiest airport in the United Kingdom.
|
| 2021 |
Tilbury power stations
Main construction work commenced for the Thurrock Flexible Generation Plant, with the project expected to take between 18 months to six years to complete across multiple phases.
|
| 2021 |
London
The census showed that 78.4% of Londoners spoke English as their first language, with Romanian, Spanish, Polish, Bengali, and Portuguese being the five most prominent non-English languages.
|
| 2021 |
London
Census records significant demographic shift: non-White ethnic minority population reaches 4,068,553, comprising 46.2% of London's population. White British population falls to 3,239,281, representing 36.8% of total population.
|
| 2021 |
London
Census recorded 3,575,739 foreign-born residents, representing 40.6% of London's population, with notable increases across various ethnic groups.
|
| 2021 |
London
Census revealed 42.9% of Londoners work from home, and 46.8% own their house outright or with a mortgage.
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| October 2021 |
High Speed 1
Renfe officially announced its intention to operate high-speed trains between Paris and London using the Channel Tunnel and High Speed 1, with the company believing such routes would be viable and profitable.
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| September 30 2021 | Stewart White announced his retirement from the BBC after 37 years as a main presenter of Look East. |
| July 2021 |
London Stansted Airport
As travel restrictions eased, Stansted Airport experienced significant disruption during summer holidays, facing staff shortages and increased COVID-19 documentation requirements.
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| February 24 2021 | The 2020-21 season was also terminated early due to the coronavirus pandemic, with teams in first place at the time not officially recognized as champions. |
| 2020 | Pitching In, a grassroots sports investment programme by Entain (formerly GVC Holdings), becomes the new league sponsor. The Southern League is now marketed as one of the three Trident Leagues. |
| 2020 |
High Speed 1
Eurostar services to Ebbsfleet International were suspended due to the COVID-19 pandemic.
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| 2020 |
High Speed 1
Eurostar services to Ashford International station were suspended due to the COVID-19 pandemic.
|
| 2020 |
London Stansted Airport
Significant impact of COVID-19 pandemic: Passenger numbers dramatically dropped by 72.2% to 7,536,869, with only 86,107 aircraft movements, though freight volumes increased to 254,573 tonnes.
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| 2020 |
London Stansted Airport
Uttlesford District Council refused planning permission for the airport expansion plan.
|
| 2020 |
London Stansted Airport
During the COVID-19 pandemic, Stansted Airport's passenger numbers dramatically dropped to 7.5 million from pre-pandemic levels of around 28 million, with a 95% reduction in passenger footfall compared to 2019.
|
| 2020 |
Tilbury power stations
Thurrock Flexible Generation Plant began advance works, marking the initial phase of the planned natural gas engine and battery energy electricity supply facility in Tilbury.
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| August 2020 |
London Stansted Airport
easyJet announced the closure of their base at Stansted, which had operated for more than a decade.
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| March 2020 |
High Speed 1
High Speed 1 Ltd, SNCF, and Lisea began exploring potential operators for a future train service connecting London St Pancras and Bordeaux St Jean.
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| March 26 2020 | The 2019-20 season was terminated early due to the coronavirus pandemic, with teams in first place at the time not officially recognized as champions. |
| January 20 2020 |
London
Recorded the highest atmospheric pressure in London.
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| 2019 | League Cup competitions abandoned due to COVID-19 pandemic |
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This contents of the box above is based on material from the Wikipedia articles Southern Football League, London Stansted Airport, Tilbury power stations, High Speed 1, London & BBC Look East, which are released under the Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike 4.0 International License.