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Major upgrades have been carried out at Colchester to make the busy Norwich to London main line more reliable and resilient.

Network Rail engineers completed an array of improvements on the Norwich to London main line over the three-day bank holiday weekend to make rail services more reliable as part of the company’s Railway Upgrade Plan.

Network Rail has secured permission to build a new bridleway bridge across the Felixstowe branch line to provide a safe public route across the railway while enabling for more goods to be moved by rail freight and improving reliability for passenger services. 

Work to install a new track on the West Anglia main line as part of Network Rail’s £170m Lee Valley Rail programme is 80% complete. The project has reached a key milestone with over 4.4km of track installed on what will become the third line between Lea Bridge and the new Meridian Water station, allowing two additional trains per hour.

A total of 19km of new overhead wires is planned to be installed between Mountnessing and Wickford on the Southend Victoria branch line over the coming months, as part of a £46m upgrade to replace the overhead wiring system.

Vital track improvements will take place between Manningtree and Witham this August bank holiday weekend and over the Autumn months, to improve reliability for thousands of passengers using main line services every day.

The footbridge at Chalkwell station on the line between Fenchurch Street and Shoeburyness reopened today (Friday 27 July) following repair and strengthening work.

Goodmayes station will close from Sunday 5 August to Sunday 12 August (inclusive) while the footbridge undergoes essential strengthening work.