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Monday 7 Nov 2016

£100m signal and track upgrade completed ahead of schedule as Network Rail reopens railway at Bromsgrove

Region & Route:

| North West & Central

The railway line at Bromsgrove reopened today (7 November) after Network Rail completed a £100m upgrade to track and signalling through the area ahead of schedule.

The project at Bromsgrove forms part of Network Rail’s Railway Upgrade Plan and has already delivered the new Bromsgrove station. This phase of the scheme reconfigured the track, points and crossings in the area around the station, and has brought into use the new signalling between Five Ways (Birmingham) and Ashchurch in Gloucestershire, in preparation for electrification to Bromsgrove. This will increase the number of trains serving Bromsgrove station from December 2017.

Richard Dugdale, senior sponsor for Network Rail, said: “This work was completed ahead of schedule, with the least amount of disruption to passengers and is an important part of our Railway Upgrade Plan to modernise the railway through the area to provide passengers with more frequent services and a more reliable, better railway. 

“Our engineers worked quickly and safely to complete this work eahead of schedule and we worked closely with the train operators involved to carefully plan these improvements to cause the least amount of disruption to passengers. I’d like to thank passengers for their patience while the improvements took place.

“Our Railway Upgrade Plan is delivering significant investment into the railway network which will provide a better, more reliable railway for passengers.”

London Midland's head of Regional Services, Steve Fisher said: "I'd like to thank all our passengers for all their patience and understanding over the last 12 days. The track and signalling upgrade will bring enormous benefits. When the electrification of the line is completed we can look forward to many more trains and more seats between Bromsgrove and Birmingham."

The next phase of the project will be to electrify the line at Bromsgrove. This work will take place at weekends ahead of the power being switched on in September 2017 and will enable more train services to serve the station from December 2017. For more information go to www.networkrail.co.uk