Power line fault stops all trains at Birmingham New Street station: Birmingham New Street new signals with Avanti West Coast train in background

Tuesday 19 Jul 2022

Power line fault stops all trains at Birmingham New Street station

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

Passengers are being advised not to travel with all trains currently stopped through Birmingham New Street station until further notice as Britain records its hottest day in history.

Network Rail’s rapid response team is dealing with a fault involving the 25,000 volt overhead electric cables outside of the station which power trains through the area.

All power has been switched off to the high-voltage cables bringing all trains to a stop.

Engineers are working as fast as they can to fix the issue and get services back on the move but at this time, there is no estimate as to when services will resume. 

Denise Wetton, Network Rail’s Central route director, said: “As predicted the extreme temperatures have impacted our overhead cables which power trains and we’ve had to stop all trains at Birmingham New Street station.

“Please keep following our ‘do not travel’ message today as journeys are being severely impacted. We’re sorry to people impacted and we’re working as fast as we can to get things back up and running.”

There is ticket acceptance in place on local buses across the West Midlands.

As this incident is ongoing people are being advised to:

  • Check National Rail Enquiries at www.nationalrail.co.uk for the latest travel information
  • Follow Birmingham New Street station’s Twitter account @NetworkRailBHM 
  • Follow the Twitter account of their train operator

People are being reminded to not travel today and to make their journeys after the heatwave has passed.

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 - North West & Central Region
0330 854 0100
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.

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