The station is located on a stretch of line first opened in 1855, when the
Eastern Counties Railway (ECR) was forced to divert its line to North Woolwich (the former
Eastern Counties and Thames Junction Railway) around the newly opened
Royal Victoria Dock. This line went on to become part of
National Rail's
North London line, although there was never a station at the site until the coming of the Docklands Light Railway. When the Docklands Light Railway extension to
Beckton was constructed in the 1990s, its tracks, between
Canning Town and
Custom House stations, were constructed on the same right of way but to the west and south side of the existing tracks. Royal Victoria station opened on the Docklands Light Railway tracks on 28 March 1994, while North London Line trains continued to pass without stopping on their tracks until that section of the line closed on 9 December 2006. During 2009, as part of the Canning Town DLR flyover and the new DLR line from Canning Town to Stratford, an engineers' siding was added to the Victoria Dock Road side of the station. On 1 June 2009 the Beckton branch was diverted onto the new flyover, which crossed the
Woolwich branch and the branch to Stratford International. The flyover was constructed as part of the 3-Car Capacity Enhancement Project to serve Canning Town high-level DLR station. (See main article
Docklands Light Railway extension to Stratford International.) It is 330 metres long, and is formed from a number of different structures connected by a continuous reinforced concrete deck cast
in situ. In addition, it allows DLR services from Canning Town towards Woolwich and Beckton to depart from any eastbound DLR platform. == Services ==