Chigwell will be among the first Tube stations on the network to lose its ticket office – with work beginning as early as February.

Station staff will be moved from behind counters – which Transport for London says are underused – to ticket halls and platforms as part of a London-wide savings drive.

Eventually nearly all stations on the network will be modernised and their ticket offices axed, TfL said.

But Chigwell will be among nine where work to remove them is set to begin in February. Others include Roding Valley, Upminster Bridge and Theydon Bois.

Hornchurch’s is set to go between April-June, with Elm Park’s closing later in the year – from October.

The changes, which TfL says is part of a necessary modernisation programme that will cut costs as well as introducing 24-hour weekend service on some parts of the network, have been fiercely opposed by unions and have led to strikes.

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