Liverpool Street platforms on Crossrail line completed

The platforms at one of the main stations on the new £14.8bn Crossrail scheme have been completed.

Liverpool Street station's new platforms have been built 37m (121ft) below ground and are twice as long as most London Underground stations.

The route, which will be called the Elizabeth line, links 40 stations across London and the South East.

Crossrail Limited, which is running the project, said 75% of the line has now been constructed.

Whitechapel station is the only central London station on the new line where platforms have not been laid.

The platforms are 240m in length to accommodate the 200m long trains which will run on the line

Nearly four kilometres (two miles) of platforms have been constructed at stations in central London

The platforms at Liverpool Street station are made up of over 500 pieces, which were built in a factory near Sheffield.

These were transported to the capital, lowered down through the station's main shaft and fitted into place.

Rohan Perin, Crossrail's project manager at Liverpool Street station said it was "a bit like putting together a giant jigsaw puzzle".

Work has begun on fitting out the stations with equipment and systems to operate the line.

Services will run from the station from December 2018.

A full service running from Reading and Heathrow in the west to Shenfield and Abbey Wood in the east will start operating in 2019.

An estimated 124,000 passengers will use the station every day

It took about four months to install the two platforms

How one of the completed platforms at Liverpool Street station now looks...

...And how it is likely to look when the station opens in 2018