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Monday 31 Oct 2016

Network Rail encourages passengers in Yorkshire to plan journeys early ahead of Christmas upgrade work

Region & Route:

| Eastern

Network Rail is advising passengers travelling to and from Yorkshire to plan their journeys as early as possible this Christmas ahead of another huge programme of upgrade work with up to 200 projects being delivered across Britain over this holiday period.

Neville Hill Depot to the north of Leeds - where trains are maintained and kept when not in service – will see vital renewals to points, which help move trains from one track to another. The investment of over £1million is part of Network Rail’s Railway Upgrade Plan, which provides more frequent and faster services to help relieve over-crowding and responds to the tremendous growth encountered on Britain's railways.

Work begins after the last service on Christmas Eve with services resuming on Tuesday, 27 December, although there will be some service alterations in the Leeds area on this day. Over 40 workers will be on site during each shift over the four days.

Passengers can find a breakdown of how their journey may be affected by visiting nationalrail.co.uk/Christmas and following #ChristmasWorks on Twitter.

Phil Hufton, managing director England & Wales at Network Rail, said: “Work takes place all year round as part of our Railway Upgrade Plan, but we usually carry out larger upgrades over bank holidays as this is when passenger numbers are at their lowest. This Christmas will see significant investment in our railway with thousands of Network Rail’s orange army working hard to deliver hundreds of crucial projects to improve Britain’s railways. This will mean changes to services over the festive period, so we strongly advise passengers to plan their journeys as early as possible.

“Despite our essential upgrades the vast majority of the rail network, over 90%, remains unaffected and will be open for business as usual.”

“This vital investment will make the railway more reliable for years to come, while improving journeys for thousands of passengers. There’s never a good time to impact on journeys and I’d like to thank passengers in advance for their patience.”

Larger pieces of work are planned for bank holidays as they are generally quieter periods with up to 50% fewer passengers travelling by rail. By starting work on Christmas Eve, this gives engineers and maintenance teams four clear days to make significant progress on major projects that will deliver significant passenger benefits.

Passengers are also advised to check before they travel if they are planning on visiting Manchester and beyond, due to important engineering work at Ordsall Chord, a new link between Manchester’s city centre’s main train stations, between Sunday 18 December and Monday 2 January. The line is closed to allow a new 300 metre section of railway to be installed.