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Wednesday 10 Dec 2014

Record-breaking Christmas investment programme to deliver a bigger, better railway in Yorkshire and the North East

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Hundreds of thousands of passengers and freight users are set to benefit from the biggest Christmas and New Year investment programme ever carried out on Britain’s rail network.

For passengers in Yorkshire and the North East, the major investment schemes this Christmas include work to boost capacity and improve reliability on the East Coast Main Line which connects the region with London King's Cross. The work taking place at Holloway and other sites on the approach to King’s Cross will begin late on Christmas Eve, once the last trains have run, and will mean some changes to normal services on 27 and 28 December.

For passengers in Yorkshire and the North East, this means fewer trains in and out of Kings Cross on 27 and 28 December; both from and heading north. Passengers should check before they travel either with National Rail Enquiries or directly with the train companies (primarily East Coast, Grand Central and First Hull Trains). These works will be finished by the start of service on Monday, 29 December.

This work is among the biggest of the schemes being carried out over this very busy period, with a further 300 projects being undertaken across 2,000 worksites across the country by Network Rail and its contractors between Christmas and New Year.

The majority will have little or no impact on passengers, with a significant portion of this work to be completed before services resume on Saturday, 27 December (no services run on Christmas Day with very limited services running on Boxing Day).

In Yorkshire and the North East, these smaller projects include:

• A bridge replacement at Dewsbury
• Work on the King Edward Bridge in Newcastle
• Track improvements in and around York station
• Track improvements on the Doncaster to Leeds line

Phil Verster, Network Rail route managing director, said: “Making the railway better is what we aim to do every day. Overall, our investment programme this Christmas is the biggest yet, and is fully-focussed on delivering a better service for passengers.

“Passenger numbers have doubled since 1997, and this Christmas investment programme forms a key part of the record £25bn being invested in our railway over the next five years. This is to meet growing demand and improve and expand our congested railway network. Passengers in Yorkshire and the North East are set to benefit from this investment with our planned work.

“With an 11,000-strong army across the country, we will deliver a huge amount of work during a quieter time for train travel*. New technology and working practices means we can keep lines open while our people work safely alongside, causing much less disruption than would otherwise be the case. This is true for the major work on the East Coast Main Line where services will still be running in and out of London, even though the work will continue until the 29 December.

"We are acutely aware that many people want to use the railway during the festive season to reunite with their families. The vast majority of the network will be running normally over the holiday period with only small sections impacted by our work. We hope passengers in Yorkshire and the North East will be able to celebrate Christmas with their families with minimal disruption to their plans.”

Elsewhere in the country, new station facilities, new platforms, new flyovers, new junctions and thousands of pieces of new, more reliable equipment will be installed and delivered in a £200m investment programme that will begin late on Christmas Eve once the last trains have run.

An army of over 11,000 engineers will be spending their Christmas Day, and the days that follow, working on the railway across Britain to deliver improvements for passengers, with new facilities and new equipment designed to reduce delays, improve train performance and build a bigger, better railway for the 4.5m people who travel on the network every day.