The opening of the new St Pancras International station from the start of service on 14 November 2007, will see the complete closure of Waterloo International. The final trains will depart during the evening of 13 November 2007. The station at Waterloo will then be de-commissioned in terms of its security role and handed to the Department for Transport. In the long term domestic South West Trains services will use the facility, but not before major engineering work is carried out to provide an easy approach and departure from the SWT main and local tracks.

At the same time as the transfer of services from Waterloo to St Pancras, the depot facility for Eurostar trains will change, with the facility at North Pole in West London closing on 13 November 2007 and a new facility opening a few weeks prior at Temple Mills, near Stratford in East London.

The change from using domestic 'Southern' dc powered lines through Kent will also see the third rail dc power equipment removed from Class 373 sets.

It has now been confirmed by Project Director Richard George that Class 66s WILL NOT be used as CTRL (or HS1) 'Thunderbirds' The number of times that diesel 'Thunderbirds' will be needed are projected to be so few that the purchase of '66s' could not be justified. Any diesel rescue will be undertaken by Cheriton-based EuroTunnel diesels which will be authorised to operate over HS1