Thursday 18 Jun 2015
Check before you travel as work to improve railway in South Wales continues
- Region & Route:
Passengers travelling between Cardiff and Newport next weekend are being advised to check before they travel as Network Rail carries out essential improvement work to improve the reliability of services across South Wales for passengers.
All railway lines between Cardiff Central and Newport will be closed on Saturday 27 June and Sunday 28 June so that essential work can be carried out to replace life-expired signalling equipment between Cardiff East and Newport West.
This will affect services between South Wales and London, Bristol, Birmingham, Manchester and North Wales.
A frequent replacement bus service will run between Cardiff Central and Newport in both directions. The bus stop for Cardiff Central will be on Penarth Rd at the rear car park exit and the bus stop for Newport will be on Godfrey Rd at the car park exit.
The work is part of a project to modernise the railway in South Wales, which includes replacing ageing signalling equipment, enhancing track layouts, building new platforms and improving stations.
Network Rail is working to deliver a bigger, better railway, bringing a number of benefits for passengers and supporting the growth of the local economy. Passenger numbers are set to continue growing and this means that we need to enable more trains to run into Cardiff.
Christian Irwin, senior project manager for Network Rail Wales, said: “We are carrying out a highly complex project to re-signal the railway in the Cardiff area which will help to improve the reliability of rail services for passengers across South Wales.
“As part of this project we are replacing ageing signalling equipment, enhancing track layouts, building new platforms and improving stations.
“I’d like to apologise to any passengers whose plans are affected by our improvement work, but I hope they will understand that the weekends are quieter time on the railway and we want to minimise the overall impact of this vital project on passengers.”
Passengers are advised to check journey plans on train operators’ websites or by visiting www.nationalrail.co.uk.
Members of the public who have questions about the improvement work can call Network Rail’s 24-Hour National Helpline on 03457 11 41 41.
Contact information
Passengers / community members
Network Rail national helpline
03457 11 41 41
Latest travel advice
Please visit National Rail Enquiries
Journalists
Network Rail press office - Hannah McCarthy
Media Relations Manager
07710 940248
hannah.mccarthy@networkrail.co.uk
About Network Rail
We own, operate and develop Britain's railway infrastructure; that's 20,000 miles of track, 30,000 bridges, tunnels and viaducts and the thousands of signals, level crossings and stations. We run 20 of the UK's largest stations while all the others, over 2,500, are run by the country's train operating companies.
Usually, there are almost five million journeys made in the UK and over 600 freight trains run on the network. People depend on Britain's railway for their daily commute, to visit friends and loved ones and to get them home safe every day. Our role is to deliver a safe and reliable railway, so we carefully manage and deliver thousands of projects every year that form part of the multi-billion pound Railway Upgrade Plan, to grow and expand the nation's railway network to respond to the tremendous growth and demand the railway has experienced - a doubling of passenger journeys over the past 20 years.
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