Media centre

Wednesday 2 Jan 2019

A better railway for passengers after Christmas upgrades

Region & Route:

North West & Central

The railway between London Euston, the West Midlands, the North West and Cumbria fully reopened today after a series of vital upgrades over the Christmas break.

As part of Network Rail’s Railway Upgrade Plan, work took place across the London North Western route - 24% of Britain’s rail network, from London to Carlisle.

Work included track renewals, signalling upgrades and platform extensions. The main schemes were:

• Remodelling of station platforms and track on Merseyside for the arrival of Merseyrail’s new state-of-the-art trains from 2020
• Major signalling upgrades to improve reliability of journey in and out of Liverpool
• Track renewal at Milton Keynes Central station
• Boosting of electrical feeds between Ordsall and Stalybridge in Manchester to provide extra resilience to power electric trains
• Signalling work at Edge Hill in Liverpool
• Drainage improvement at Ashton-under-Lyne in Greater Manchester
• Drainage improvement at Hampton-in-Arden near Birmingham Airport
• HS2 preparation work at Euston station
• East West Rail preparation work at Bletchley
• Rebuilding platform 11 at Watford Junction station

Martin Frobisher, London North Western's route managing director at Network Rail, said: “I’d like to thank passengers for their patience over the festive period. We understand our work can be disruptive, but it is carefully planned to cause the least disruption to the fewest people. The upgrades and maintenance carried out will help deliver a bigger, better, more reliable railway for passengers in 2019 and beyond.”

Across the rail network 25,000 people worked round-the-clock over Christmas and the New Year on more than 300 projects.

Passengers can plan their journeys and check before they travel at www.nationalrail.co.uk.