http://www.bloomberg.com/apps/news?p...UD318&refer=uk
quote
London's $32 Billion Crossrail Proposal Clears House of Commons
By Reed V. Landberg
Dec. 13 (Bloomberg) -- London's effort to build the 16 billion-pound
($32 billion) Crossrail link from Heathrow Airport to Canary Wharf won
the support of the House of Commons today, bringing the 18-year-old
proposal closer to reality.
The lower chamber of Parliament approved the Crossrail Bill at its
third reading without a vote, allowing the proposal to pass to the
upper House of Lords in the coming weeks. Both houses must approve the
measure for it to become law.
Prime Minister Gordon Brown's Labour government along with the
Conservative and Liberal Democrat opposition parties support the plan,
which would spur the U.K.'s biggest transport infrastructure project
since the Channel Tunnel and ease the strain on the aging train
network in the capital.
``It will support the development of London as a world city,'' Tom
Harris, a junior transport minister in Brown's government, said in
Parliament in London today.
Stephen Hammond, a Conservative lawmaker who shadows Harris, said he
supported the bill but wanted more details about how the Treasury,
London businesses and residents of the city would finance the plan.
The railway will connect Heathrow airport with central London and then
run 5 miles (8 kilometers) east to the Canary Wharf office development
starting in 2017.
The project includes digging two 14-mile (22-kilometer) tunnels
beneath central London. Construction may begin in 2010 and would
reduce congestion on the London Underground.
Bechtel Group Inc., the San Francisco-based construction company that
built the Channel Tunnel, was hired in 2005 to oversee the design of
Crossrail. London Mayor Ken Livingstone has said Bechtel will be one
of a handful of companies considered to build the railway.
Construction may begin in 2010.
Unquote

Will the Lords be able to amend the bill so that Reading, Ebbsfleet
and possibly Stansted become the logical termini?