Track upgrades to close Liverpool Lime Street on Sunday 8 November

Friday 18 Sep 2026

Track upgrades to close Liverpool Lime Street on Sunday 8 November

Region & Route:: North West & Central; | North West & Central: North West

Rail passengers planning to travel to or from Liverpool on Sunday 8 November are being advised of important improvements which will impact journeys.

Liverpool Lime Street will be closed to overground services for essential maintenance to the track in the Mossley Hill area.

The work will see track foundation stone – called ballast – strengthened and secured by specialist tamping trains*.

While this happens, no passenger services can travel through Mossley Hill - a key approach to the North West’s second busiest station.

Rail passengers will still be able to access the city centre on Sunday 8 November – either by rail replacement bus or by using the Merseyrail network.**

People are being encouraged to plan ahead by visiting nationalrail.co.uk so they know exactly what to expect from their journey and can allow extra time to get where they need to be.

The station facilities at Liverpool Lime Street will remain open for passengers, with extra staff on hand to help passengers with their journeys.

Paul Owen, Network Rail’s Area Director for Liverpool, said: “We know there’s never an ideal time to close the railway, so I’d like to thank people in advance for their patience while we carry out these essential railway improvements.

“We’re working closely with our train operator partners and colleagues at Merseyrail to provide alternative travel options into Liverpool on Sunday 8 November and encourage people to plan ahead by using National Rail Enquiries.”

For the latest travel information, please visit nationalrail.co.uk.

Notes to Editors

* Tamping is where large machines raise train tracks in the air and vibrate the foundation stone (ballast) underneath them and compact the individual stones together.

** The following train operations are affected by track maintenance on Sunday 8 November:

Avanti West Coast: Trains to/from Liverpool Lime Street will run to an amended timetable and be diverted via Earlestown.
East Midlands Railway: No trains will run between Liverpool Lime Street and Sheffield. You should use alternative train operators between these stations.
London Northwestern Railway: Trains will start/terminate at Liverpool South Parkway. You can use your ticket at no extra cost on alternative services between Liverpool Lime Street and Liverpool South Parkway.
Northern: Trains will run between Hunts Cross and Manchester Oxford Road. A replacement bus service will run between Liverpool Lime Street and Hunts Cross.
TransPennine Express: Trains between Liverpool Lime Street and Cleethorpes will start/terminate at Warrington Central. A replacement bus service will operate between Liverpool Lime Street and Warrington Central.

Avanti West Coast and London Northwestern Railway services will also be affected by planned engineering work between Stafford and Crewe.

£3.5m of railway upgrades are taking place on the Merseyrail network earlier in the month, with closures on the Northern and Wirral lines from 11 October to 6 November.

Contact information

Passengers / community members
Network Rail national helpline
03457 11 41 41

Latest travel advice
Please visit National Rail Enquiries

Journalists
North West and Central Media Relations
Press Office
Network Rail
NWCmediarelations@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.