Background
The station is on the High Speed 1 railway between St. Pancras and Ebbsfleet International. As the station lies just inside the eastern boundary of the London Olympic Park, much of the surrounding land was little more than construction site until mid-2012.
The tracks descend into tunnel at both ends of the station as its platforms are closer to the surface than the tunnels; some of the platforms have a noticeable dip along their length at the east end. Stratford International has four platforms in the station box: two at the outer edges and two shorter ones forming a central island. The mainline through tracks run down each side of the station between the adjacent platforms. There is a waiting room on the island platforms but not on the outer platforms.
Thirty-five metres beyond the eastern portals, the tunnels pass just below the Central Line tunnels turning north from Stratford Regional. The bottom invert of each Central Line tunnel is only 4.3 metres (14 ft) and 8.0 metres (26 ft) above the high-speed running tunnels.
The station was not authorised by the Channel Tunnel Rail Link Act 1996 and an order under the Transport and Works Act 1992 had to be made to allow for its construction. In the centre of the station is a single-track inclined viaduct, rising to the east end along and above the length of the island platforms. This is to allow out-of-service trains to leave the station box and reach the depot at Temple Mills.
Read more about this topic: Stratford International Station
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